Author Topic: The Character Designers Guild
CmndrCodi2 
Registered: Mar '08
24076_Clonetrooper
Date Posted: 3/23 5:10pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I didn't see anything about this in the initial post, but I'd like a second opinion.

This is a new character I created for a recent RP, and I want to know what you guys think...


After it was approved, I posted:

Character Name: Mika Etheral

Age: 17

Gender: Male

Species: Human

Alignment: neutral

Affiliation: Jedi Outcasts

Appearance:
basic look, but with brown eyes & hair, no beard, a scar on his right cheek, and a mechanical left hand covered by a glove


Force Sensitive: Yes

Goals: Destroy the Jedi to get revenge for his banishment.

Short history: Mika was the top student at the Jedi Academy, having his mechanical arm from the age of two due to a birth defect. He was banished from the Order because he murdered another student out of hatred. He joined a group of rouge Jedi on Jabiim, and has since become their leader. He learned to cast Sith lightning from his remaining flesh hand, and has access to Sith powers when angered or provoked. He rarely uses them, because if he uses more than Sith lightning, the amount of power being channeled through his body will weaken him to the point of a near coma.


If this is against the rules, I'll edit it out.

 

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Lordabc123 
Registered: Jul '07
6258_Stormtrooper
Date Posted: 3/26 3:30pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I asked to post long ago. I finally finished.


Name: Juroth Mathosithois

Gender: Male
Age: 20
Species: Trandoshan
Homeworld: Trandosha.
Affiliation: Galactic Empire,Trandosha Army
Personality Juroth is relativity pacifistic by his people's standards, however he is by no means an unskilled fighter. He believes in taking setient life only when nessasary. He enjoys hunting game to hone his skills and combat proese. Unlike most Juroth is not for the enslavement of theWookiees but not particuly found of them.

Appearance
---Skin Color:Brown
---Eye Color:orange
---Clothing: Varies, usually wears a suit of enhanced Stormtrooper armor that has the blaster resistance of clone trooper armor.

---Other Details: he wears a pair of cybernetic hands over his natural claws. This is to ease his use of human oriented weapons
:

---Religion: Scorekeeper.

---Personal History: Juroth was born to an influential military family. At the age of 15(when a Trandoshan reaches adulthood)he joined the planetary army. He rapidly advanced through the ranks, gaining experience combating pirates, terrorist groups, and “peacekeeping” on Kashyyyk. The reptilian youth strongly disliked his time spent on the Wookiee homeworld protecting the slavers he so despised, among them one of his own hatch mates.

Seeking additional experience he joined the Imperial equivalent of the Judicial Fleet at the sector level, a place relatively free of anti-alien biases. Progressing from commanding one regiment to many he took part in a series of successful campaigns. The most notable involved crushing a segment of the Corellian Resistance operating in the region.

The battle began with the seizing of the Judicial armory by tens of thousands of insurgents who in short time overpowered the unprepared garrison. Juroth's unit was first on the scene. With just a few thousand men and a few artillery pieces he completely decimated the numerically superior force guarding the armory's exterior. With the arrival of additional judicial and full fledged military units, the battle was quickly won.

Unfortunately, not all battles would be so easily one. Juroth's greatest failure came at the Battle of Bimmisaari (the capital of both the Mytaranor and Halla Sectors) where he failed to stop the destruction of a cold fusion plant by members of the Mytaranor Slaving Council,in an effort to halt the crackdown on the rouge group. While his Battlegroup was stationed on the capital world operatives of the group planted explosives in the capitals cities main power plant. Threatening to destroy to the plant unless Sectoral authorities halted their assault on the unauthorized slaving ring, Juroth was to liberate the facility while officials negotiated.

Covertly entering the facility, Juroth and his men quietly and decisively picked of the slavers one by one and seemed on the verge of victory until the remaining slavers caught on and deactivated the radiation safeguards, preparing to denote the planted explosives, and consequently the entire facility. The slaves vanished and Juroth and his men barely escaped immediate area

The resulting explosion released intense rays of gamma radiation which left hundreds of thousands of civilians dead, but left his troop's relatively unscathed do to their sealed battle armor.
After winning several medals for his heroism he returned to his native Dosha a hero with his head held much lower then when he had left three years ago. Over the next few months he regained his confidence hunting big game at his estate. Just before the Battle of Yavin he was recruited by a high ranking imperial advisor and became one the few non-humans in intelligence.

 

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witchdoctor187 
Registered: Aug '07
46375_2008 Olympics
Date Posted: 3/26 5:32pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
Here is my character that i was going to use for Sentinel's RP velvet Trail, just looking for some constructive criticism. thanks grin


Name: Nathan McAllister (Captain McAllister)
Gender: Male
Age: 34
Appearance: Nathan stands 6’2 and weighs185 pounds of lean hard muscle, and even though he is past his prime, his body is still toned and powerful, which makes Nathan look like an opposing figure to any stranger who didn’t know him. His white skin is tanned from the years under the wilderness’ sun, causing Nathan’s complexion to be rugged but still have a look of youthfulness in it. His unkempt dark brown hair grows down behind his ears. Nathan’s eyes are a penetrating hazel and have the look of a man who has seen much death and war in his life, but also the look of a man with years of experience and knowledge, but in the weary eyes also lays a glimmer of hope. The unshaven stubble and his dark gotee on his face add to his tough and rugged demeanor. Nathan carries many scars including three gun shot wounds, one to the abdomen, one to the right shoulder, and another on his left thigh. His knife scars include one to the left side of his torso and across another to the back of his left shoulder.

Clothing: Nathan wears two shirts, changing between a white cotton shirt and a green shirt. He wears a pair of buckskin leggings, which cover his knee high moccasins. On his head he wears a weather worn black cowboy hat with a brown leather hat band. And when the weather is not permitting, Nathan wears a buckskin jacket. He also carries pouches made of buckskin that were given to him by the Lakota, which are decorated with the tribe’s intricate beadwork. Most of his buckskin clothing came from his days as a mountain man.


Notable Possessions: Nathan carries a large arsenal of weapons, which include a Spencer repeating rifle, a Berdan’s sharpshooter rifle, a 69. Ferguson rifle, a 36. Colt Patterson revolver, a bowie knife, and a tomahawk.


Backstory: Nathan was born January 30th 1816 in Springfield Missouri where his family owned a farm in the Ozark Mountains. At a young age, his father taught him how to hunt, trap, and shoot a rifle, efficiently. Nathan worked on the family farm until he was 19, and that is when his restless and adventurous spirit caught up to him and Nathan had the itch to explore the world around him. So when he turned 20, he hooked up with a party of trappers out of St. Louise that was going to trap and hunting their way over to California and then head North to Fort Vancouver in Oregon. This party of trappers was lead by a young trapper and guide named Jedediah Smith. While on the trail Nathan grew up fast, he had to if he wanted to make it in the vast and dangerous wilderness and survive the constant Indian attacks. He traveled with Smith all the way up Fort Vancouver, and was one of the last surviving men after the rest of the men in the party were slaughtered by a group of Indians while heading in Southern Oregon. After trading the pelts at Fort Vancouver, Nathan parted ways with his friend that he had traveled with all these months. He knew Jedidiah had a bright future ahead of him and that he was a man that people would know.

From there Nathan struck out on his own and began to trap independently. He trapped up through Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana. He even went south a ways down along the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and then headed into the Four Corners territory where he hunted New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. By the time Nathan was 28 he had hunted and explored every piece of land on the west side of the Mississippi. Nathan also became friends with the many Indian tribes of the regions, including the Sioux, Lakota, Cherokee, Black Feet, Crow, and Cheyenne. But not all Indian tribes were his allies; Nathan came into many various scraps with death when he came across wandering bands of Comanche, Apache, and Pawnee. But after years of being away from his family and home, and having more shaves with death than he had liked, Nathan again grew restless, but this time he was eager to go home. He had grown accustomed to his wilderness home, but he knew that he had to go back to Missouri and face his demons, mainly his family, who still felt as if he had abandoned them to go off and be a mountain man. So he made the long and perilous journey back to his home state of Missouri.

Nathan returned to Springfield where he became a work hand on one of the outlying large farms and ended up marrying a girl he had known since he was a kid. Life was going well for Nathan the first two years of marriage, and he and his wife were even considering having a child until his wife came down with Typhoid and died a few weeks later. Nathan soon hit rock bottom after his wife’s death, he wandered and mostly hunted, going up into the mountains at week’s even months at a time, but always returned. He had even taken up drinking though he never let it get to him enough to where it would led him down the path of foolishness. Nathan’s livelihood was gone from his life, he was now broken, an empty shell of the man he was before, it seemed as if he had no more soul, just a ghost. Nathan no longer wanted to stay where he was at, walking by his wife’s grave and being reminded of his inability to do nothing as his wife lay there and die. At nights Nathan would always be awaken by the call of the wilderness, or the high lonesome as the mountain men called it. Every day that passed the urge became ever stronger until one day it pushed him over the edge, forcing him to finally give into his passion for the wild. And so he packed his things and abandoned his house, heading out west to the New Mexico territory, where mountain men were in high demand as scouts. He trapped, hunted, and traded with the Indians, and served as a scout for the Army a few times.

Nathan fell in with the Texas Rangers and served as a scout. After serving a year with the Rangers, the idea of becoming a Ranger lingered in his mind. Nathan signed up for the Rangers and was soon helping to hunt and rid the land of the Comanche tribes and the Mexican raiding parties that had crossed over the Rio Grande. Nathan served well over his years in the Rangers, and even achieved the rank of Captain. He stayed on with them for a few more years before he headed north up to Wyoming and became a Bounty Hunter. He fit in well with his new profession, but bounty hunting was a dangerous job, but I paid well, and it hardly mattered if the law wanted the outlaw dead or alive, of course it didn’t matter to Nathan either. Nathan was good, better than good, he was the best, and soon earned the reputation as the best bounty hunter in the territory, young lawmen admired and idolized him, and outlaws feared him and cursed his name and the woman who had brought him into this world.

Nathan was fresh on the trail of his latest bounty, a man by the name of Joseph H.W. Payne, a deadly gunslinger and outlaw who had killed more than his share of lawmen, even some of his friends who were Texas Rangers. Nathan had tracked him to Fort Vancouver Oregon but learned that he had moved on about a couple weeks ago and got hooked up with some of the boys from Slade’s gang. Someone had heard something about them going down into the Utah territory, a place Nathan knew well, very well, he also knew that it was a great place for a man to get lost if he was on the run from the law. It was a vast and barren wasteland that only a crazy man would choose to go into. After staying in town for about a week, Nathan heard of a man, Dylan McRae, who was hiring men to go with him into the Utah territory. This peaked Nathan’s interest, because Nathan knew that land better than any man this side of the Mississippi, plus he just might come across his bounty along the way. He soon packed his things and went down to the place he was supposed to meet Mr. Dylan McRae


Miscellaneous: Nathan is a serious man, but does have a good sense of humor. He is a skillful marksman and survivalist, which he picked up from his years as a mountain man. He tends to carry large caliber weapons, fitting the motto of “better safe then sorry”. Nathan likes playing cards and even a drink once and while, but when it comes to arrogance, Nathan has a short fuse, relationships between Nathan and arrogant men have often led to the boastful man lying on the floor with blood coming out his nose.

Plot Seeds:

 

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DarthXan318 
Title: Forum Feud Winner
Registered: Sep '02
13619_Padme
Date Posted: 4/3 6:42pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild - Date Edited: 4/3 7:06pm (1 edits total) Edited By: DarthXan318
So... question!

How do you guys go about creating a character?

Obviously, you have a blank character sheet and you start filling it in, but - which fields do you fill in first? Do you just brainstorm by throwing random facts in and seeing what you get, or do start with a concept in mind? How do you pick names? Do you leave things intentionally vague to be filled in IC later, or try to define everything in the sheet? And so on... I'm sure we all have different ways of going about it, even though the end result is still a filled-in character sheet.

Edited to add: what about recycling characters? Do you ever re-use character sheets - perhaps say you created one and it fell through for whatever reason - do you use it again in some other game?

I'm asking because the characters I create seem to range between "has the depth of cardboard" and "horribly complex and difficult to stay IC" and generally the middle ground is ... more ideal. tongue

 

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Chukles38 
Registered: Jun '05
43225_Anakin Solo
Date Posted: 4/3 6:51pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I generally always start with a physical description. The name is usually one of the last things to come, although I have a bunch of names I like and use them according to which game I'm going for. I also sometimes make up random names... such as Straven Fermare. tongue Just a name that popped into my head.

Once I have a description, I'll work on personality and then weapons if applicable. last will come the bio, and then usually the name. I generally try to make the CS's relatively detailed, though have created vauge ones that have made gameplay a blast to develope the character in.... points out Straven again. tongue

 

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NickLitYouAFlame 
Registered: Feb '07
44304_Padme Watching the Jedi Temple
Date Posted: 4/3 7:27pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild - Date Edited: 4/3 7:33pm (1 edits total) Edited By: NickLitYouAFlame
I nearly always start with species, but normally have a concept in mind. Occasionally, I will base my character off of a faction.

I kind of hop around when I pick names. I actually use baby name generators, a bit. Other times, I take a word and find it’s equivalent in another language. I also use cities, states, countries, etc…

A good idea might be to base your character off of one thing, to keep him consistent. You need to make sure you know what you want your character to be and then build around that goal.

I personally don’t recycle characters, because I think it’s better to create a unique character for each game, to make sure it fits the era and will work. I think you cop out on part of the experience if you frequently reuse the same character.

 

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LightWarden 
Registered: Oct '01
19249_20-Sided Die
Date Posted: 4/3 8:03pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I usually start with a role in mind. I usually think in terms of either "I need a character to do ______" or "This is an interesting ability/species/faction/motivation, I wonder if I can expand on it?" and then I work out from that point, trying to figure out what makes sense without involving shoehorning the character into every major event in the galactic time scale. I'd provide an example, but most of the ones I have are spoiler-y in terms of stuff I'm still going to use in my games.

 

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DarthXan318 
Title: Forum Feud Winner
Registered: Sep '02
13619_Padme
Date Posted: 4/3 8:17pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
Yeah, I like Straven too - the group dynamics we have there are quite cool to play. grin


... Now I'm trying to answer my own question and it's harder than I thought. I think I usually start with a vague character idea - sometimes it's locked down by the game (like in Lea Monde), but usually it's not. So to continue the character-examples-taken-from-Dark History thing, I started by deciding I wanted to play a newly-minted Jedi Knight. Once I had that, I filled out the description - species, age, gender, basic appearance.

Bio and personality next ... I work on those simultaneously because they go hand in hand, but "work on them" is kind of an euphemism for "brainstorm random facts and see what happens" which is kind of something I should change, I think. I try to keep it as vague as possible so I don't end up boxing myself into a character I can't actually play, while still keeping a framework in place to work from, which ... doesn't always work. Starting with a role in mind ... that's a better idea ... thinking

And then I shamelessly use the Star Wars Random Name Generator to get a name.


Sometimes I'll reuse characters, but only if I think there's more to explore with that character - like my character in the Senate is a heavily modified version of a Jedi Padawan I played for about a week a few years ago.

 

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darth_nemisis 
Title: Host:
Acolytes of Darkness
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Registered: May '04
23731_Palpatine
Date Posted: 4/3 8:22pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I usually always have a concept in mind when I begin to create my character. Depending on the game and the type of character (Jedi, Sith, Bounty Hunter, Senator, etc), I immediately think about what type of personality that character will have. I try and make a variety of personalities with my character (not sure if I succeed in that tongue ).

Then, I practically just go down the list on the CS. At times, I usually choose the homeworld last (unless I have a specific species that is native to one planet). I don't know why, but it is just something that I have always done.

And then I shamelessly use the Star Wars Random Name Generator to get a name.

I tend to use that a lot, especially when I am really lacking in the creative department. tongue

 

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Saintheart 
Title: Manager and Wandering Swordsman of the RPF
Registered: Dec '00
40047_Gandalf
Date Posted: 4/3 8:43pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
It's pretty organic for me; more often than not an image of a character will pop into my head and I'll just design something around that. Cho-Shai Adimus, to continue the Dark History vein, evolved fundamentally out of a brief mental image of a bald-headed Jedi Master who uses rapiers a lot; kind of a "Patrick Stewart in Dune" sort of thing. The rest of the character formed out of that. Dark History did allow me to put a twist on the standard Master shtick, though, in that the Order of the period doesn't frown so much on emotion, which at least still allows me to get angry, joyful, or laugh from time to time without risking Teh Mastership. As for the name, I've never really had a problem with it -- the hyphenated first name is a Qui-Gon cliché, I know, but it was a deliberate choice because of events that are to occur later on.

 

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Despised1 
Registered: Jul '05
39878_Sidious
Date Posted: 4/4 8:16pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild - Date Edited: 4/4 8:18pm (1 edits total) Edited By: Despised1
darth_nemisis posted:
And then I shamelessly use the Star Wars Random Name Generator to get a name.

I tend to use that a lot, especially when I am really lacking in the creative department. tongue


I actually have a list of names that I keep, every once in a while a name will pop up and I will store it away for later use. Often I will use names of ancient cities, or even current ones. Other times I will use a language translator and type in a word I want to use to describe my character, then use the translation if it sounds cool.

For example.....Zardeth Kul (which I changed to Zardeth Khul) and Har Meggido (considered to be the root word for armageddon) are both ancient cities. I have also used Settsu Genji, who is said to be one of the first great ninja of the ancient Japanese empire.

Then there are others I just make up from nowhere. Making names is fun. tongue

 

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SephyCloneNo15 
Registered: Apr '05
8068_R5-D4
Date Posted: 4/5 11:58am Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I usually start one farther than a concept or a role. I begin with what I like to call a Gimmick or a Hook. I figure out the type of character I'll be playing and what makes them unique (one of the earliest examples was Eris Ji-Vanne, a Jedi who only used blasters in combat. He's probably the easiest example of a gimmick to grasp without too much explanation). From there, I figure out why my character has that gimmick and just sort of deal with background and personality all at once. Then I deal with the superficial stuff, name, age, weapons, appearance, etc. Occasionally appearance and race will work their ways into the Gimmick part, but if not, they're almost always towards the end. Then I can usually bash my hand on the keyboard (:p) or, more often, take a name I'd like to associate with my character, like a combination of other characters or actors and Star Wars-ify it.

Hmmm....here's an interesting topic of conversation: Are there any types of characters you feel daunted by playing? Are there any perfectly acceptable angles (read: not the makings of a Gary Stu) you tend to avoid in character generation? For example, my characters are exclusively male or male-personalitied. I wouldn't know where to begin playing a female character.

 

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NickLitYouAFlame 
Registered: Feb '07
44304_Padme Watching the Jedi Temple
Date Posted: 4/5 12:05pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
I've started to avoid full Jedi. Sith are pretty bad, too. I am more tuned for smugglers now. Like, I am making a character for Dark History, who is the son of a smuggler, a drunkard, addicted to deathsticks and who's only claim to fame is his phenomenal shot, despite being completely wasted. And, he is stuck on Nar Shaddaa. So, I'm hoping Ktala approves that. But, yeah, I don't like playing standard force-users anymore.

 

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JEDI_TEEGIRLOO 
Title: Forum Feud Winner
Registered: May '05
45271_Assaj Ventress
Date Posted: 4/5 1:33pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
Hello everyone. happy

Well i still use force users but i have learned to change species instead of the usual human. I think next time i will avoid the force user and go with something else.

 

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darth_nemisis 
Title: Host:
Acolytes of Darkness
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Registered: May '04
23731_Palpatine
Date Posted: 4/5 5:41pm Subject: RE: The Character Designers Guild
Are there any types of characters you feel daunted by playing?

Well, like you said Sephy, I usually stay away from female roles for the sole purpose that I don't really know exactly how to RP a female role. I think, sometime, I am going to give it a try because I would like to expand my RPing talent a bit, just to see if I can do it. I do think that it could be fun, so i am definitely goig to give it a try...perhaps in the next game I join.

I do like to play Force Users. I know this is a common thing, but I just really enjoy doing it. I guess it's just because I really like the concept of the Force and a childish part of me wishes that I could actually have powers like that. tongue And, it's just fun, and, really, that's what RPing is all about.

I don't really not play any specific type of character (except for the female aspect). I have played a wide variety of characters (jedi, sith, smuggler, senator, Bounty Hunter, normal person...) I can't really think of any type of player, at the moment that I have played. So, yeah, I am not sure if I stay away from certain types of characters.

 

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