How well thought out are your characters?

[Karla]

I treat every level of my characters as a new chapter in their life. I know exactly how I want the basic storyline for most my characters to go up until at least level 3. Of course, I can't control all the quests, but I have a basic outline in my head for where I want all my characters to go in each chapter of their life.

For instance: Karla has no clue where her sister is right now. At level 1 she will hear about someone who looks like her walking in the same area. Level 3, Karla will meet up with Krista, but something will be wrong (I ain't telling what) and so they end up having to face off with each other every time they meet until the issue gets resolved at level 4.

So I ask you, anyone else think this far ahead for their characters?

[Zook Murnig]

I have Caduceus' development as a man and a magician planned out in the abstract. I know how he'll gain healing magic, how he'll obtain dual-elemental spells, and the basic effects on his personality that his development will have. Hell, I have a higher level profile of him saved on my computer, with angelic and elemental summoning magic that he'll gain much later on.

Beyond his development in those ways, I try to go with the flow of things and who I may join quests with, and I'm planning to involve him more in the world of Althanas at large.

My other characters are just...there. I'll use them when I feel it is appropriate, and I don't have any big plans for them.

[Breaker]

I try to let my quests and battles influence my character as much as possible. That's not to say I don't have certain goals for him, or that there aren't certain skills he'll definitely get at the next level up, but for the most part I just play character development by ear.

[Leaf on the Wind]

I've got an annoying habit of overthinking my characters. So I'm trying to think about them as little as possible on Althanas. I know their histories, I know one or two people in their backgrounds, but I try to keep it limited to that.

[Elijah_Morendale]

I have an idea where I want to take Elijah and further his "relationship" with his split personality, but it will involve him settling down in his hometown for a level or two and falling in like with a girl.

[Karuka]

Mmm...I don't think the initial characters out much at all, I just give them a goal, a history, and then let them sit and develop for a little while.

Then I put them down on paper, and they rarely write the way I thought they would. Just like people. I define their goals after I know who they are and what they'd do.

[Lucis]

All of my more recent characters (those made in the past year or so) never quite turn out how I thought they would. From level 0 to level 1 things usually go through dramatic changes, though sometimes they don't. I don't plan many things out beforehand, but I have all my level 1 profiles updated far before I reach the first level update.

My characters just seem to write themselves as time goes by. I don't always know what they would do, but once I get into the mindset that I am not writing about a character, but I am writing as the character, things just fall into place.

[Zerith]

I'll admit that when I originally created Zerith, I had a small idea of what I wanted to do with him. Since then though, he's alreacy achieved his initial goal of finding hiis dad. So with that out of the way, I had to find new ways to continue his story. Which I've done.

To answer the question, the next chapter of Zerith's life is much more well thought out now that when he was lvl 0. I'm really looking foward to the next quest that's hopefully going to start soon as it would mark the beginning of a new chapter for not just the halberdier, but for anyone that goes through the same thing. I'm absolutely sure that once people read it, they'll be able to understand why.

[Mutant_Lorenor]

Lorenor is well planned out. I had a basic character sheet and storyline prepared for him when I first created him back in Tanthanas. The story has been revised several times but the basic story of conflict and turmoil is still there at its heart. As far as Lorenor's goodies go, I have his whole Ability and Skill Tree planned out to about level 10. I like to plan ahead cause it makes my life easier and it makes it easier on the mods when its time to get my level updates approved :P. With the newer version of Lorenor I have a basic story in my head but it tends to deviate on its own for one reason or another as I write it and my gut instinct says to go in a different direction than what I initially had plan. All though its good to have a game plan, you should definitely try to deviate from it when your heart is telling you how to write the story. That happens to me a lot. My latest Solo Quest is going in a completely different direction than what I initially intended for it.

[Sorahn]

I left Sorahn fairly open. I remember a thread similar to this one a long time ago and an interesting point was brought up (I think by Yari, no less). It was that if your character's story is mapped out to the T, you'll find that almost all of your quests end up being solos. Or at the very least you have some other people questing with you, but filling roles that you have defined for your quests.

So I wanted Sorahn's background and personality to be as detailed as possible, to give myself as much material as I could to draw from. I got a general idea of what I wanted to do with him, then set him loose. This makes it very easy to participate in tournaments and random battles and other people's quests without having to painstakingly edit them into the over-arching story.

Yes, I have had a few threads very specific to Sorahn's story. One in particular being the Rehn Mehnas series, which I soloed because I really needed it to be exactly right. But writing that story just proved to me why I didn't like writing massive solos. I got bored with it after a while and it ended up taking me well over a year or more to actually finish the dang thing. It was a chore.

So all I say is be careful planning out complex stories really far in advance. At least make them flexible. Because solos or pre-planned quests can get very boring very fast. Leave yourself some room to join a PG, or get in a tournament, or just quest with some other people. I think it will add a lot to your Althanas experience.

[Saxon]

With Saxon, its give and take. I know the material for maybe the next three or four quests I'm going to be doing with him, but I don't see them being started or done any time soon. Sorahn/Yari are right in saying that a person who maps out their storylines will have a hard time finding people to work with. I often find myself thinking of different characters people have and how I could fit them into what Saxon/Fibonacchi are doing and what it'd be like. Unfortunately, however, I've been a bit slow trying to find a happy medium with people I work with and attempting to complete my side of the story so that it feels fluid with each other. But, it does come along, no matter how sluggish it might be. I'm also lucky in the fact that working alone in writing doesn't bother me a bit, in fact, I find myself more motivated and excited to write things on my own then to have to manage stories and what not. It can be really exhausting. =P

I'm excited to announce that I've got a huge project coming up after the FQ that involves drawing various writers from around Althanas and trying to write short stories with each other. But that is so far off I haven't had the time to even worry about it, so it'll be shelfed for now. I've grown a bit relaxed with Saxon over the couple of years I've had him, and since his purpose was to be a medium for mythology, it isn't quite as hard to fit him into different plot lines as it ought to be. I expect that whenever I get around to leveling the stories will become more and more thrilling as more and more privileges and open doors are offered to Saxon. I don't doubt that this character more then any other I've ever created will be used in published work, but I've got a long road ahead of me before things of that sort are even considered. ;)

I've put a lot of time and thought into Saxon, and I'm pleased with what I can create with him. He's unique, I've developed a keen personality with him, and he's even the first character I've had besides Jobe that I learned to drop the 2x4 dialogue and started fresh. I'm excited with what he'll unfold into, but eventually I'm going to have to start charging a fee for some of the crap I've been coming up with, haha.

[Artifex Felicis]

I made Leon off a bet in an AIM convo.

Not very.

Of course, going beyond that I have a couple things I want to happen to the fuzzball, but it's all very abstract. I suppose one problem is that Leon has done maybe one or two truly epic things in his life. Going beyond that, he didn't volunteer, with one exception, to them. It's fun, but at the same time Leon also is somewhat limited in how I can take the next step. Of course, I have enough ideas to keep him going, but I do not have the specific plans.

Then again, I've always liked the idea that Leon's always just been in the right place, and is good enough to impact anything large he does. Everything else is just how life goes at him.

Also, one other problem. I hate anything truly epic or astounding at the early levels. It sort of destroys how people, realistically, should think of your char. One example is that Leon how Leon should be fairly well known for his exploits, especially in Scara Brae, Raiaera and Corone. Yet for the most part he is an anominous as a level 0. Part of that is how Althanas is structured, but also because I don't want Leon to be "all that" just yet. Still, people should be able to recognize him no matter what realistically, though I don't really want that. Still, little plot holes like that can get smoothed over later and as needed.

[Atzar]

Khariss is completely open. I have no story in mind for him. I just stick him in whatever environment is supportive of his personality. He's my "contribute to Althanas" character.

Huacamon had a storyline originally, and I'm going to try to restart it at some point in the future. While I'm floating in limbo, however, he's kind of on the backburner.

Atzar's had so many fucking storylines at one point or another that I've almost given up on him. I get into the idea of one plot, and then midway through a quest... "Wait, this would be better..." At that point, I try to make a transition between the old plot and the new. It hasn't worked yet.

No, though, I don't look into the future. I'm always thinking about the quest at hand, rather than one down the road. Again, I've tried doing the "down the road" crap, and it's yet to work.

[Call me J]

Jame is strangely the character I've put the most and least effort into. His part of Time Enough, in many ways, is like an extended profile. I don't mean that in that its describing him, but its what brings some sense of conflict into his life. In that sense you could say he's very much well planned. However, once the FQ ends, he'll have no purpose at all, unless he's given one. Hopefully by that point he'll have IC friends who can give him direction/PG or I'll come up with something.

[Camella]

Sure, if you plan out exactly what you want to do to with your character and are really rigid with it, you won't get too much enjoyment out of althanas, but when I created this topic under the username Karla, I was talking more about the general direction you want your characters to go more than anything else.

[Call me J]

Also, one other problem. I hate anything truly epic or astounding at the early levels. It sort of destroys how people, realistically, should think of your char. One example is that Leon how Leon should be fairly well known for his exploits, especially in Scara Brae, Raiaera and Corone. Yet for the most part he is an anominous as a level 0. Part of that is how Althanas is structured, but also because I don't want Leon to be "all that" just yet. Still, people should be able to recognize him no matter what realistically, though I don't really want that. Still, little plot holes like that can get smoothed over later and as needed.

I generally agree with this. The other problem you can have when you do something astounding at level 0 is you have to top it later. I mean, if your character saves the Universe and makes out with the cheerleader by level 1, what's left? Settling down with the cheerleader and going into the office from 9 to 5?

Anyways, I personally like to have enough of a plan with all my characters that I can give them enough storylines to get to level 2. Most of the storylines are relatively simple, and relate to the character's establishing himself in the trajectory I want the character to go. For instance, Jame wasn't really even the Jame I intended to play until after Time Enough.

In general, I've tried to make my intro character's history as vague as possible while giving them a sense of what they should care about. Damon's history made him hate vampires, Molotov's made him bitter, Jame's made him a bit of a bon vivant, Brock's made him an asshat, etc. However, because I made things vague, I could go back and revisit them for storylines that added detail. When I first made Molotov, I had only included he'd recieved formal education. Later, because it added to the story, I wrote a series of flashback quests that talked about how he was a scholarship student that never really fit in with the other kids.

If three levels from now I want to bring in a character from Jame's childhood for a story, I could pretty much bring in any character under the sun, as long as he would be someone Jame would have met in his relatively opulent childhood.

To me, nothing until level 1 should even be considered canonical. Hell, I'd even be willing to see someone change their character's race or something like that, because sometimes you have a really good idea, but its flawed a little and needs tweaking. Either that or you put in something that just doesn't work. I mean, I slightly tweaked Damon's age at level 1, just to have it make more sense.

[Saxon]

I had used to get wicked images and thoughts about what it'd be like to have a level 20 character that you brought up, cultivated, and made on your own. It'd certainly take the meaning of demi-god or 'hero' to a whole new level. ;)