Posts belonging to Category Character archetypes
Posted by Ravyn on December 13, 2010
Some villains try to take over the world. Some try to destroy it. And then there are the ones who end up targeting concepts, as often as not ones important to the protagonists. Yesterday’s Generic Villain post, and some conversations I had about it, got me thinking about these sorts of antagonists, and I found [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Characterization, Concepts, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice, Technique |
Tags: archetypes, concept-breakers, roleplaying, writing | 
1 Comment »
Posted by Ravyn on November 23, 2010
For me, the toughest part of presenting insane characters has always been their portrayal. There’s a lot to balance: making the character different without making her obnoxious. Not turning her into a one-note character, nor offending/triggering people who have had to deal with real live mental disorders (one of the reasons why I tend not [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Characterization, Characters in the world, Concepts, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice, Technique, Voice and Style |
Tags: Characterization, insanity, roleplaying, writing | 5 Comments »
Posted by Ravyn on November 22, 2010
Insanity is an interesting character trait, when done properly. It creates a little differentiation between the character and those otherwise like her, lets you explore a slightly different style of logic (particularly when you’re going for rational except for a few important details, or when the challenge is seeing what kinds of things you can [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Characterization, Characters in the world, Concepts, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice, Technique, Voice and Style |
Tags: Characterization, insanity, roleplaying, traits, writing | 5 Comments »
Posted by Ravyn on August 23, 2010
One of the advantages I’ve always found of tabletop RPGs as compared to console RPGs is the ability to talk to one’s enemies, whether it’s face to face, by distant proxy, even (perhaps especially) in the middle of a battle. In fact, battle banter is one of the few situations in which I will almost [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Character dynamics, Characterization, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Motivation, Secondary characters, Technique |
Tags: antagonists, conflict, roleplaying, willingness to talk, writing | 3 Comments »
Posted by Ravyn on July 15, 2010
Like everything else, how much authority and in what form people are comfortable with varies from person to person, and from character to character. I find, though, that there are certain bands in which they lie, and knowing about these bands can make for an interesting way of further differentiating characters and figuring out where [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Characterization, Concepts, Exercises, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice, Technique |
Tags: authority levels, Characterization, Exercises, roleplaying, writing | 3 Comments »
Posted by Ravyn on May 20, 2010
The robe and wizard hat. Guns and black leather. White labcoats and peculiar equipment. Breeches, a nice jacket and a riding crop. A military uniform and a wide-brimmed hat with a chinstrap. A bag of dice and a backpack that makes one’s back hurt just looking at it. What do all of these have in [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Character image, Characterization, Cliche, Description, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice, Technique |
Tags: Characterization, description, role-playing, visual cues, writing | 1 Comment »
Posted by Ravyn on February 25, 2010
(Warning: This is a late-night post, deals with some rather intense subjects, did not go through my editor, and as a result should probably be read as conjecture. Hopefully it’s interesting conjecture.)
One of my friends asked me today, “why do so many decent character types get outlawed in literature?” He went on to talk about [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Character creation, Characterization, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice |
Tags: original posts | 1 Comment »
Posted by Ravyn on February 12, 2010
When I did my rant on plot device characters, Michael pointed out that there were alternatives to being a passive plot device, mostly having to do with one character wanting to use another as said plot device and the second character having none of it. Yes, yes there are, and most of those sorts of [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Character autonomy, Characterization, For Roleplayers, For Writers, Plot, Technique |
Tags: original posts | No Comments »
Posted by Ravyn on February 11, 2010
“I am a plot device. Pay me no mind.”
It’s pretty obvious when this is how a character is designed. She—in the really old stories it was usually a she, as often as not she’s a she now, and what set me thinking on this tonight was the title character of the Welsh tale “Branwen, Daughter [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Character autonomy, Characterization, For Roleplayers, For Writers, Plot, Technique |
Tags: original posts | 1 Comment »
Posted by Ravyn on January 5, 2010
Some characters have roles that encompass most of their personality. Some have traits that are supposed to set them apart from other characters. Still others can be traced pretty easily to a standard character archetype, and then there are those who sling their catch phrases whenever possible. These are all character gimmicks, and they all [...]
Categories: Character archetypes, Character creation, Character development, Character image, Characterization, For Roleplayers, For Writers, GM Advice, Player Advice, Secondary characters, Technique |
Tags: original posts | 1 Comment »