Jump to content

Thoughts on Face Claim Rules/Trends


Dale Bozzio
 Share

Recommended Posts

I imagine most people on this site aren't very into the 5-/5+ and other types of rules common on sites that just hinder and limit the writer's options, but I figured it'd be nice to find out where exactly everyone stands in regards to this very topic. I know there's already threads in regards to the deceased FCs side, so this could be for just in general.

 

Personally, I am annoyed by the faux-inclusivity predominant in the community. They encourage the use of diverse FCs, but the moment you do use somebody that might have a double chin or have skin that's possibly a bit too dark or not have a cookie cutter look, they tend to get ignored. So much preaching but hardly any actual practicing.

  • Fuck Yeah! 1

giphy.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I despise +/- rules because I find them exceptionally unrealistic. Just because someone is 30 doesn't mean they "look 30". What does 30 look like anyway? Put me and 3 of my closest friends together all of whom are 30ish, and none of us look the same in terms of age. The only time it really matters is with children who tend to grow/develop rather rapidly and sometimes teenagers. Once you're an adult, though, you really just need to view age in broad strokes. In my personal experience, most admins who have +/- rules are often very nit-picky or micro managers who worry more about aesthetics than they do about  accurate character representation.

 

Personally, as long as the character looks appropriate and they don't show markers of being too old/too young (e.g. significant wrinkles on a twenty year old) I don't care who is used. Be accurate on the generalisation, but don't try and dictate that just because Actor X is 30 that means they can only portray a 25-35 year old character.

 

In terms of other rules regarding face claims, I don't think I've ever seen them (beyond the fact you can't use internet famous people or whatever - I hate this rule but I understand it). I don't think that admins should dictate the playbys that are used except to ensure that you're not just taking someone's images off facebook and using them; essentially, our rule is that they have to be considered "famous" be that internet, hollywood, whatever. Similarly, why does the colour of a person's skin matter except in the sense that it is a visual representation of that person and their ethnicity? If my character has an Indian background, I should use an Indian (or Indian-appearing) playby because that's what they would look like. If people don't like that then they're just shallow and stupid.

 

Fat. Thin. In between. Black. White. Brown. Tall. Short. Tattooed. Pierced. IT.DOESN'T.MATTER. It's just what your character looks like and everyone should have the option to represent their character as a part of their real world.

  • Agree 4

FBTAff-4.png
FBT is an original (modern) supernatural rpg.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Idk who has time to go googling pb ages, but that is not a life I'm living.

 

Pb rules are never even a consideration when I'm drawing up rules. Probably because idgaf. 

  • Agree 2

 88x31buttondandy.png

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm definitely not sure why the +5/-5 rule came into place, especially when it doesn't seem to be a very popular or well-received rule in terms to the member base. Some years back and that rule was nowhere to be found. I find it really frustrating that it's taken the real life PB roleplaying forums by storm. I have a really hard time finding a site that doesn't have that rule anymore...

  • Agree 2

AFF1.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Operations Mod
On 8/26/2021 at 9:41 PM, NyxDarklore said:

Just because someone is 30 doesn't mean they "look 30". What does 30 look like anyway?

 

THIS. 

 

I work in a hospital urgent care center where I interact with patients born between the late 1920's into the early 2000's. There is absolutely no correlation between age and appearance. I cannot tell you how many times I've looked up and assumed a patient was mid 30's to early 40's only to intensively verify their info and confirm that they're between 65-80 years old. On the flip side, I also frequently deal with patients in their late 30's to early 40's who look like they're in their late 60's and got hit by a fucking truck. 

 

Hell, I'm almost 30 years old myself and semi consistently get stopped and asked for ID in bars and liquor stores that I've semi frequented for five friggin years. 

 

Furthermore, I hate the +5/-5 rule because it limits character portrayal. 

 

I specifically chose Betty White as the FC/PB of my werewolf clan matriarch because of her long lasting acting history. I can use BW to portray this character from childhood to old age (and Betty White looks better at almost 100 than my own grandmother did at 70) - but on sites with that idiot rule, I can't use BW as a playby.... why? Did the last 90 years of her acting career just not exist? 

 

On 8/26/2021 at 6:22 PM, Dale Bozzio said:

They encourage the use of diverse FCs, but the moment you do use somebody that might have a double chin or have skin that's possibly a bit too dark or not have a cookie cutter look, they tend to get ignored. So much preaching but hardly any actual practicing.

 

This is painfully true. Too many roleplayers and related internet figures want to SJW signal, but when it comes down to being actionable they suddenly just fade into the background - unless they're coming out of the woodwork to attack someone for not portraying that darker skinned, double chinned or otherwise different character to their liking. 

  • Agree 2
  • Fuck Yeah! 1

 

bannerlong.png

0_mainsignature (1).jpg

rpgida.png

Icon & Profile set by The Inquisitor of Dragon Age: Absolution

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Dragon said:

I specifically chose Betty White as the FC/PB of my werewolf clan matriarch because of her long lasting acting history. I can use BW to portray this character from childhood to old age (and Betty White looks better at almost 100 than my own grandmother did at 70) - but on sites with that idiot rule, I can't use BW as a playby.... why? Did the last 90 years of her acting career just not exist? 

 

Betty White looks freaking amazing and honestly, if I didn't know her age, I wouldn't think she was that old. It's the same for a lot of playbys I find. I get it, you don't want Jared Leto portraying a teenager with his current appearance, but at the same time, that doesn't mean that he's only able to portray someone within a hair's breadth of his actual age. Hell, when you consider movies people aren't ever cast like that. Alan Rickman was not 30 when he played Snape. Richard Harris (and later Michael Gambon) were not in their 100s or even close to (though Richard Harris pulled it off). People are chosen based on looks that suit a character and that is all that should matter.

 

Also Betty White is the best choice for a werewolf matriarch. I love that idea so much.

  • Love 1

FBTAff-4.png
FBT is an original (modern) supernatural rpg.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So, face claims are a big pet peeve of mine. Not even getting the whole +/- 5 thing; most times FC are required, they don't allow original art. I am not allowed to draw my character the way I see them. I am required to use a person/anime/manga character. I guess I can understand that there'd be more cases of art theft, but imo its easy enough to prove that the art is your own. Any time I see an FC requirement I walk away. Doesn't matter how nice the site it or how interested I  am in the RP. 😕

  • Agree 1
  • Preach it! 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am in the same boat as you @Naya, I'm an artist and I'm so used to drawing my own characters that not being allowed to really turns me off. That tells me that a site is more interested in being "visually cohesive"/"pretty" than it is in the RP. Which I suppose is fine--but it's not for me, for sure. Finding FCs is always such a trial for me, too, and it's so... limiting? I've seen it said elsewhere that some people don't like having appearance sections on a bio/app because "that's what FCs are for" which is... odd to me. Even if I picked a FC, they can't possibly look 100% like my character, because they... aren't? My character? 

 

I agree too with the +/- 5 thing. And that your FC has to be a living person--so no using old photos of a singer from the 60s or something. I wonder where this trend started--it seems like something that people encountered and replicated because they just thought it was the Thing One Does. 

  • Agree 1

OrielBannerBigger.png.a2ce06c92c5f48951844c258d418d92a.png

A Gilded Age 18+ Original Fantasy RPG

Site | Lore | RulesGetting Started | Discord

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree 100% with the frustration of not being able to use your own original art, or even art you've purchased to represent your character. Why is it that on so many forum roleplays the representation of the character has to be from already established media sources? This mentality doesn't extend to places like DeviantArt or even Tumblr, but forum roleplays tend to stick pretty strictly to this rule over the majority of options available.

AFF1.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Okay as far as the -5/+5 thing -  I am not sure I have seen it but I don’t tend to write elsewhere unless their rules are somewhat like my home forum. I agree ages and looks are a really stupid call. As stated by many- people do not look their ages all the time and frankly its up to the writer who and how they want their FC including original art if allowed.

 

I have used FC living and dead- when I create a character I get a sort of idea of looks and go from there. I am not a big fan of perfect faces- Kudos for Betty White!- I want faces that have character to them, or a look that fits with what I am creating.

I don’t think limits on those things is a good idea. Limiting creativity on such things would put me off big time because you the writer KNOW what you want as a Face, the look the character even scars or wrinkles etc.

  • Agree 2

623de32ccbe3e666561967.png

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 9/2/2021 at 1:25 PM, caporushes said:

I am in the same boat as you @Naya, I'm an artist and I'm so used to drawing my own characters that not being allowed to really turns me off. That tells me that a site is more interested in being "visually cohesive"/"pretty" than it is in the RP. Which I suppose is fine--but it's not for me, for sure. Finding FCs is always such a trial for me, too, and it's so... limiting? I've seen it said elsewhere that some people don't like having appearance sections on a bio/app because "that's what FCs are for" which is... odd to me. Even if I picked a FC, they can't possibly look 100% like my character, because they... aren't? My character? 

 

I disagree that it's all about being visually pretty (though I will not join sites that mix playbys because I do like the cohesion). As someone who uses real life face claims, my reason for it is to provide a visual of my character (just as someone who uses drawn art is doing). It's not about being pretty, it's about providing a representation that feels and looks real to me, something that I have never achieved with drawn art. A drawing never looks real in the way that I want it to. I recognise that is not the experience for everyone, but I see it simply as casting my character in a movie (where the site is the movie) versus having them drawn for an anime or cartoon or some other animated medium.

  • Fuck Yeah! 1

FBTAff-4.png
FBT is an original (modern) supernatural rpg.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Contributions Mod

It’s one of the many rules out there that is just a waste of space and designed to control. It used to be a 7 years and now it’s often 5.

 

I’m 36 and pass for being about ten years younger. I remember a couple of years ago, someone asked me if I went to the local high school. On the other end, I went through puberty abnormally early. I was wearing my first bra at 8 and was done growing at 10. I passed for being about 5 years older than I was.

 

This rule was basically created because someone was really attached to some actor and the site was a high school or what have you. Such rule isn’t needed because an admin can just send a message that a 30 year old doesn’t make a plausible 16 year old and to change the face.

 

Whenever I see a site that has an age limit rule, I assume that the site and admin are into trendy playbys, apps are probably going to be image heavy with a lot of gifs (I suffer from chronic migraines), and they’re going to attract people who form rp relationships based on how popular the face is. Perhaps unfair, but that’s where my mind goes.

 

On mine that I’m building (pretty much done outside of some touches here and there), playby is based on appearance. Charlize Theron in Atomic Blonde is a different person than she is in Aeon Flux. I also allow celebrities who have been around along time to be used as family members, so Winona Ryder from Stranger Things can be the mother or aunt of Winona Ryder from Beetlejuice. I have that family rule because I look a lot like my father and aunt (his younger sister), to the point where if someone grabbed a picture of me when I was a child, aged it to look like the 1970s in Photoshop, and told you me and my aunt were twins you’d believe it.

 

As far as deceased playbys go, I’ve so far stayed away from those conversations because my mom and uncle died almost exactly twenty four hours apart six years ago. At times, I’ve felt like I’m the only one that cares. It comes across as erasure of the deceased celebrities existence. I end up feeling rage as a result. It can also feel comforting to see the smiling face of a celebrity that’s deceased that a family member or friend enjoyed and died in a similar manner. People who create such a rule have never experienced a traumatic death of a loved one and I don't appreciate the gatekeeping on how people grieve. 

 

Going back to playby age or specifically playby image age, it can also be character building. If you have a character dressed in retro 90s style, double if the style is considered uncool, that’s interesting. It suggests the character has a unique or unusual sense of style and likely goes shopping at thrift and vintage clothing stores. It implies a lot more about the character than just popular celebrity in currently trendy clothing. It also makes little sense to me because since the 2000s fashion has diversified. I can buy commercially produced clothing inspired from 80s New Wave music videos, Edwardian and Victorian era, New Age that look like something Stevie Nicks designed, Rockabilly, all online. Many have magazines. I can also import clothing from other nations. I can buy a good chunk of this stuff on Amazon. There are stores like the examples in my rural California county. With that in mind, I don’t think it’s that strange to use Doris Day from the 50s or 60s to represent your character.

 

As far as faux diversity and inclusion, I remember a few years back I was just randomly looking at sites to get different ideas. I came across a real life site with an announcement stating that if they didn’t get more people of color, they would ban the creation of white characters. I decided to take a look at staff characters. If you guessed that the vast majority were of obvious European descent in their 20s with names typical to the Anglo nations (UK, USA, Canada, Australia, etc), you get your favorite kind of cookie! I’m bisexual and love to write characters from different cultures. I have three books behind me I still haven’t read: one on Hungarian culture, one on Japanese culture, and one on popular Buddhism in Japan. I actively avoid sites that state they want/are diverse and inclusive. I feel like both me and my characters are being treated as trading cards or patches on a girl scout’s badge. I feel objectified and fetishized. I’ve seen one too many posts and even rules or announcements like the above that I’m wary.

 

With artwork and real life playbys, most only go for one style either because of cohesion, mentality of what a playby is, or how a segment of people cannot form attachments to certain mediums. @NyxDarklore went into cohesion and a bit of mentality of what a playby is to some. I’ll go into the latter a bit more and what I mean by attachments. I’ve noticed in the real life playby world, many see it like casting an actor in a play. This is why actors tend to be the most popular playbys. When people mention allowing art side by side with real life a lot of people go, “Like Roger Rabbit?” Others see their artwork existing side by side with real life seeing it like a storyboard prior to filming or CGI creation for a monster. Neither way is wrong. The last part is that I’ve noticed there is a small segment of people that have a hard time watching animation. This segment hasn’t watched animation since childhood so when trying to watch it as an adult there is an emotional dis-attachment. There is a smaller segment that is the opposite, in that they have a harder time watching live action than animation.

 

On my site, I’ve come up with what I think is a decent compromise. Typical humans are real life playbys, but you can use artwork, video game CGI, movie CGI, etc for characters that transform or otherwise. Thus, your character that transforms into a sea monster, you can draw it and use the artwork to represent that. That being said, no one can be everything to everyone. By doing the above, I may gain people, but I’m also losing others because their mind doesn’t process like that.

 

Oh and I saw part of the conversation that likely inspired this thread, and NyxDarklore, Dee Snider is an awesome playby.

  • Like 1
  • Agree 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I didn't mean that rudely, although I guess it came off that way! (For which I apologize, that wasn't my intention at all.) I understand other people not feeling the same way I do--like I said, I'm an illustrator so I do tend to filter things through that lens. I think visual cohesiveness is just not high on my list of priorities for an RP site, which is part of what I meant by "pretty". I mean I personally don't mind if someone has no image for their character all--an aesthetic/unrelated image or whatever as an avatar is fine with me, too. So I generally chafe at ANY requirements for FCs beyond "has permission to use original art" and like "should be a public figure" for real people. 

 

I also don't, like, fancast actors when I'm reading a book or anything either, and to me RP is in a similar boat. 

  • Like 2

OrielBannerBigger.png.a2ce06c92c5f48951844c258d418d92a.png

A Gilded Age 18+ Original Fantasy RPG

Site | Lore | RulesGetting Started | Discord

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Mistress Of The Obvious said:

Oh and I saw part of the conversation that likely inspired this thread, and NyxDarklore, Dee Snider is an awesome playby.

 

I liked your thoughtful response but I wanted to reply to this part - he is awesome and for the character just perfect. I'm sad I cannot use him anymore but he's one of those characters that has just been retired because it was too much to keep playing him after the breakdown of those RP relationships.

 

3 hours ago, caporushes said:

I didn't mean that rudely, although I guess it came off that way! (For which I apologize, that wasn't my intention at all.) I understand other people not feeling the same way I do--like I said, I'm an illustrator so I do tend to filter things through that lens. I think visual cohesiveness is just not high on my list of priorities for an RP site, which is part of what I meant by "pretty". I mean I personally don't mind if someone has no image for their character all--an aesthetic/unrelated image or whatever as an avatar is fine with me, too. So I generally chafe at ANY requirements for FCs beyond "has permission to use original art" and like "should be a public figure" for real people. 

 

I also don't, like, fancast actors when I'm reading a book or anything either, and to me RP is in a similar boat. 

 

I don't think you were rude so much as you have a different perspective than everyone else. For me, I do actually cast actors when reading a book too (I have a difficult time with internal visualisation and that helps). I think it's just different for everyone.

  • Like 2
  • Love 1

FBTAff-4.png
FBT is an original (modern) supernatural rpg.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Bit of a bump, but to show further insanity derived from the 5-/5+ rule, there is a site stating that if they're an actor, they must have at least THREE projects in the last FIVE years listed on IMDB in order to be used. This erases many celebrities from being used whether it's because they're older and not getting as much work, focusing on theatre or other careers that keeps them in the public eye that wouldn't be listed on IMDB, and practically anyone that takes break between acting jobs.

 

This is proof that these rules are less about realism and more about control and keeping with trends.  How are RPers supposed to be creative with such guidelines?

  • Agree 3

giphy.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use, Guidelines and Privacy Policy. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.