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A Bazillion Characters


misfit
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This is something that kind of bothers me.

 

People who join and make a character and without very many posts, make another one, then another, and another, and so-on until they have 7 different characters. Don't get me wrong, I love having multiple characters. It's an excellent way to try out different aspects of a rp, and if you're doing onexone that's pretty normal. However, I sometimes have issues with seeing members have so many character, make a few threads, plot A LOT, but they don't really take them anywhere.


And while I'm writing this, I kind of see some advantages to it, too. Like what if you just don't know what you want to play? Why not try it all until you find a few favorites.

 

Still, it's just one of my pet peeves.

PLAGUED

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I never really get why this bothers people. If they want to make a bazillion characters I don't really see the issue with it. If they don't want them at some point they can always be dropped. I also hate character limits and having a strict limit on characters will make me side eye a site so hard, leave and never look back again. 

 

I have over 40 people on one site alone, all but a few are involved one way or another with someone else and get used, it might not be all day every day but they've got plans. Each one is a work of art and I love them all dearly. 

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Yes but I also have noticed that it means a lot of plots are dropped and never visited again, but to each their own.

Edited by misfit
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PLAGUED

Post-Apoc | Supernatural | Zombies

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I'm half and half on this. I mean on one hand I get that having a variety of characters is a good thing. Having a few characters means they can get involved with numerous different characters without having to force situations. (It can feel pretty contrived if one of their characters known for avoiding the bar scene is meeting a frequent party-goer in a crowded bar... )

 

At the same time though, there's kinda a point where get a few characters going first (maybe 1-2) before starting more. This way if something happens and that player ditches they aren't leaving large numbers of characters around and stranding a lot of plots. (More a concern when they're tying up popular face claims...)

 

Now if face claims aren't an issue and they haven't really integrated themselves into the story then whatever. 

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"There are three sides to every story... Your side, their side, and then somewhere in the middle is the truth."
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Off topic a little but I avoid bar scenes like the plague but I've been known to cut a rug now and again, catch up with my hard core party friends at the self same bar I avoid. This is where character growth and interaction in uncomfortable positions come in. I like characters that grow and do things that are unexpected.

 

Its also pretty easy to toss out ditched characters and for left standing characters to adapt (character growth is a wonderful thing) to that character being gone. If they're not your plots and your characters left standing whats it matter? Personally I like when a character that is involved with mine leaves or is ditched or what have you. It allows for me to place them in a situation they have to learn, adapt and grow from. I don't like stagnancy in characters, they become one dimensional to me if they are plotted out the wazoo. 

Edited by jenneral_jennson
All the typos
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I regularly write a lot of characters myself. Particularly because when a need comes up in a plot, ideas for characters that suit them pop into my head. But I've never ditched anyone and left anyone hanging because I lost interest in my characters. Usually it's other people who ditch me, and oddly enough, it's usually someone with few or no secondary characters. Maybe it's just the circles I play in.

 

People who create a lot of characters, then drop one or more without warning are frustrating. In the trek rp, it tends to be that people will commit to a lot of unconnected games with one or two characters each, then start neglecting some of them because they committed to too many for them to keep up with. This is especially hard to handle because usually when it happens, they just seem to completely disappear and it's only from talking to others in the community you find out they're swamped with a dozen or more other games, or you're having to constantly chase them.

 

So, I don't mind it when people stay on top of their commitments, but dude, I am judging you so hard when your poor judge of what you can handle leaves me high and dry... Especially if you can't be bothered to admit your mistake and cut back on your commitments yourself.

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I'm a little bit on both sides of the coin. More extremely on the side that character limits aren't worth the trouble because I like characters and I like writing new ones/jumping into new plots on a whim, but...

 

I think having limits is crippling to an extent in that if you have a 3 character limit and everyone has 3 that are involved romantically and a new person joins, intent on the romantic side of RP... They're kind of screwed out of why they joined. However, as others have mentioned, plots can get dropped, etc. I think having no limit but requiring people to earn their other characters somehow (hitting X amount of posts, buying them from a shop, etc) is a good middle ground. 

 

I'd much rather someone make a million characters and eagerly jump on new people to get involved than new people get shunned because they can't get the kind of plots they want due to limits. It's one of those things that you'll never satisfy everyone on. 

 

I write characters like mad. It's stress relief for me and I like being able to dive on to new members' want ads if I'm capable of it. But I can totally understand why some wouldn't want people with 60+ characters running around. 

 

That said, if a board requires me to post on every character X amount of times every week in order to keep them, I run for the hills. There are times when some characters just don't click for me or whatever. I shouldn't be punished because life gets in the way or someone else isn't replying to a thread, but that's a little off topic.

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I think the only time an activity minimum *per character* should be enforced is when it pertains to a character holding an important position, and it should only apply to the character/s holding the position/s. In a Trek game, that may mean that a player needs to keep their character who's a department head active regularly, but no one should be counting posts about that ensign down in waste management that they're writing just so their BFF has someone to ship with. Or in a game with canons, someone locking up a high profile canon that's not regularly using them is potentially holding up the game, but their oc can come and go as needed.

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Captain Amelia Waterhouse, Commanding Officer

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"It is human nature to yearn to be what we were never intended for. It is singular, but it is so." -Mark Twain

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I was going to say something similar Death Kitten. If the character in question is an OC, has no rank or whatever, it shouldn't matter how many a person decides to create. If someone has an itch to make a character because they have a sudden idea and doesn't effect a game timeline then go ahead and make as many as you want. More power to ya and have fun. 

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I used to be like this. I was upset because people were being flaky, but ultimately because threads were being neglected.

 

Personally I feel that roleplaying is a game and we should understand not everyone wants to play the same exact way that we do. And that's okay.

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I love loads of characters. Some types of sites really need limitations and I understand that but... I've always thought it's kind of lame when the reason is "face hogging." If it's not hurting you, then why does it matter if somebody has a lot of characters? Eh.

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I don't request all the characters to be active at one moment, because our story alternates focus on a group or another, and while a group is insanely active, others are on the backburn. This is exactly why I encourage people to make characters in all groups.

 

As long as the characters are active in their ongoing threads (ie no existing thread is blocked by a character not posting) and no character is needed in a thread and isn't there (this is mostly about collective threads where there are certain characters who need to do or say something in order to move the plot), there can be as many as a writer can keep up with. If you don't have time to write a certain scene, you can imply it happened offscreen or you can postpone actually writing it for when you actually have time. 

 

It starts being problematic when a writer leaves and 6-10 characters remain in limbo... but this is what creative writing is about, finding solutions which get new plot points.

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I find it mildly irritating when people keep making characters and do not do anything with them. So I get why others might find it irritating. But as my site has no apps or face claims, it doesn't actually affect me and my members are pretty good at figuring out when someone isn't worth getting involved with (in this case, because the person just wont do anything.)

 

But really? Logically? It doesn't matter. People will come up with ideas and leave them again it's just (sadly) part of the game.

 

Like other people said, the creative challenge is kind of fun anyway.

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19 hours ago, xexes said:

I used to be like this. I was upset because people were being flaky, but ultimately because threads were being neglected.

 

Personally I feel that roleplaying is a game and we should understand not everyone wants to play the same exact way that we do. And that's okay.r

While I agree and understand that RP is a hobby and that people have differing time and interest levels for it, there is also a degree of commitment to others involved in it because it's a shared hobby. So people who get busy and give me a heads up that they'll be slow to get back to me, people who set activity expectations on the way in, I'll do what I can to work with... but if someone comes into a game with activity expectations outlined in the rules, does not talk to staff before they join if they can't keep up with the expected activity, or fail to let staff know if their availability changes, I don't have sympathy for.

 

So, make as many characters as you can keep up with, and if you don't have time to use all of them all the time, that's cool. But please make sure that anyone you're writing with knows when you're going to be slower to respond than they expect. Communication is key, and is the difference between someone taking on more than they can handle, and everyone enjoying the game.

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Captain Amelia Waterhouse, Commanding Officer

=/\= Join =/\= Roster & Openings =/\= Rules =/\= Chat =/\=

"It is human nature to yearn to be what we were never intended for. It is singular, but it is so." -Mark Twain

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I never care how many people can have as long as they keep up with them and they are not PB hoarding. First I find the obsession with using PB's overrated anyway? (But I also hire a lot of artists) But like don't ship your character with mine because 'Lee Pace', you ship your character with mine because you like him as a character! So with that aside, what I did to help curb this was have in the rules.

 

 

Character 1 must have at least 20 IC posts before Character 2 is allowed. Character 2 must also have 10 posts before character 3 and so on. So 20 the first character (which for us can be done in one night, and no games didn't count) and then 10 for each new character.

 

 

I'm more relaxed with this board because it was for a long time invite only so someone could vouch for this person, but now that we are starting to dip our toes a little with the idea of at least listing the board on the bigger directories I may need to revisit this rule.

"Everyone has been doing so much soul searching during all of this,

and I'm just over here drawing pics of my character's dicks."

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