[Rhubarb]

Other character, starts at pretty much the other end of the spectrum. He begun as a cold, demented warlord over a large clan but later turned into  my favorite character.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hehe, I love when that happens. The little fuckers have minds of their own. That's totally what went on with the first guy I mentioned, the one who's my favourite. I created him when I was 15 and wanted to have some generic angsty goth type in a fantasy setting, but he was far too self-aware to adhere to the role. Every time I tried to get him to do something, I'd end up with shit like...

Marcus stared coldly into the face of his enemy. "It seems you have underestimated me," he said in a voice devoid of emotion. "You tried to appeal to my sense of mercy... how were you to know that I have none?" At this point, Marcus paused suddenly. "Why the fuck am I saying this?" he asked the world at large. "It's stupid."

Me: "Goddammit, not again." *erase erase erase*

This should totally become a character-oriented thread. I love hearing about other people's. Anyone have any drawings of their chars?

Actually, what would be cool is if we could all pool our characters into one convoluted 'story', just to bounce them off each other and see what happens. I used to do that with my best friend, each of us contributing alternate paragraphs, and it led to some awesomely funny exchanges. They always ended up arguing like petulant children. :D

Oh yeah, something just occurred to me. Anyone here played Reality-On-The-Norm? I never ended up making a game, but the character of the Baron was my contribution... the dude I mentioned in the previous post, the gentleman assassin.

This post has been edited by Rhubarb: 10 May 2005 - 02:28 PM

[Icey]

I was thinking 'bout starting a thread similiar to that, written in journal format or something like that. So not only would the characters bounce off each other, but we'd get to see that from THEIR point of view. But that might be a bit complicated, a bit of a dash from my other collaborative writing projects. But I'm more than game to participate in something like this, just give me a setting and I'm in.

I played several of the RON games, excellent project, one that I'd like to participate in had I game making skills.

[Rhubarb]

Damn, didn't expect anyone to actually agree to it. I'm shite at organisation. Plus I'm going to bed in a minute. But I'll totally continue this later.

I prefer third person. My characters are far too real to me as it is without actively encouraging assimilation. But yeah, I'd have to think about it.

We should limit the people involved I think, to make it less complicated. Although I can't really see an enormous amount of people clamouring to be part of it.

[barend]

The problem with all my characters is that to make things easier i have based a majority of them on different parts of my own personality. but they all have access to my intelligance (even though i limmit some), but they tend to end up in conversational stalemates (if they're enemies).

i have a non violent interrogation scene that goes for 2.5 pages (4 paperback)... i only really wanted it to go for a paragraph, but as I let the two talk, i kept finding out so much about them, so i kind of left them too it. and everytime the interigator was about to leave he would think of something else to ask...

[Icey]

On collaborative efforts: Hows about some modern settings, fictional city area thingie and let everything go?

When it comes to making the settings for my stories, that is really the point where I suck. I usually don't write anything in modern settings, the Fallen (which is suspended AND can be found here in the screening room) is the closest I've gotten to a semi realistic modern settings. So my inability to plan out a world, really does show, which is why I try to be vague about most background information and just take notes when I write something in, even Pratchett kicks my arse when it comes to planning and sculpting out a world beforehand.

I have really only made one cultural world that I didn't blatantly rip off or just sum up in a single paragraph, which I use for SciFi and Fantasy. It's basicly a split nation of midget lizardmen, grouped into eight base clans. That is a world that I am still trying to flesh out properly since I have an ambitious story that requires that world to be told. Fear of fucking it up and losing intrest in it has held me at bay from starting to write the damn thing.

[Rhubarb]

The problem with all my characters is that to make things easier i have based a majority of them on different parts of my own personality. but they all have access to my intelligance (even though i limmit some), but they tend to end up in conversational stalemates (if they're enemies).

Definitely. :|

All of my characters are aspects of me in some way, and all of them are quite smart, because I consider myself smart... I don't think that's really a problem though. It kinda just boils down to planning moderation with exposition and info, making sure that you don't reveal too much too soon. You have to be strict with the characters, and be quite sure beforehand what you want established in this scene, and how much of the plot you want to reveal. Maybe you could, like, note the majority of the conversation down in another file (or whatever) and put the information in the story later on...?

Having said that, I suck at following my own advice on this matter.

Also, are their personalities different enough from each other? Characters with certain dispositions are going to be less inclined to reveal information to someone else, because they're too frightened, or too resentful, etc. I dunno, just a thought.

Icey: You totally sound like me. Settings are my weakest point. The one I have with the story about the General is kinda elaborate, but only in a very general sort of way (no pun intended). And only because I've been trying to flesh it out for a year or so. And I still keep fucking up. There're hardly any scenes I can write without running into some major snag that results from having no clue about the place these guys are running around in. I'm forced to keep rewriting scenes as I slowly think up more elements to use. I fully expect that not a single scene i've written so far will make it into the final draft, and I'm actually reluctant to write anything because of that.

For the collaborative effort, I don't think setting is that important. My friend and I used a place called 'Log-World', which was like, a tiny dimensional world that was just a forest clearing with a log-bench in it. Because there was fuck-all there, it forced the characters to interact with each other (mostly complaining about how there was nothing to do).

[Slade]

I tend to be very sparse in describing my characters in any way. You mostly just figure things out from watching them. Woo for subtle exposition! Also, their appearances are usually negligible as well except for a general brief blurb of what they look like.

But most of the time, my settings aren't important, it's the characters interacting that takes the focus so you don't realize that you don't know what anything really looks like.

And I wouldn't have found L&E way back in 2001 if I hadn't had an urge to see if sequel were ever made to the first Rob Blanc game. From there came YTotW and Reality on the Norm, and L&E/Polymorph.

I had always meant to make a game starring the Bum, but never got around to learning the engine properly.

[Rhubarb]

Slade - yay! Subtle! It's probably a better way to get the audience's imaginations working and so forth, not giving descriptions. I just focus a fair bit on appearance because I tend to draw my characters quite a lot, what with having a desire to illustrate comics. Speaking of which...

Hee hee hee. Is it just me or does the first guy look like Heccubus? :D

[J m HofMarN]

Damn that's a good drawing, regardless of who it looks like.

[Laughlyn]

Woah, that is good, certainly puts my 'scribble in half an hour at the pub' stuff in perspective.

I think you might want to switch artists JM.