Whenever I'm creating a character, I usually start at what I want for the *present* first.Â
Namely--- I try to come up with a personality I'd like them to portray, a specific skill or two I'd like them to be proficient at (or even horrible at), and maybe a certain career or calling. Then, once that is all said and done, I use the history itself to explain the why's and how's behind those traits.
For this purpose, history is incredibly important to me-- but that doesn't necessarily mean that I let the history control the character. Rather, I use their past as a way to augment and round out their present into something dimensional for me to work with in RP.Â
As a result of this, the history is a direct reflection of the character's personality and vice versa-- a character with more complex behavioral patterns should naturally have a more complex backstory to explain why they are the way they are. Conversely, the less complex a personality, the less complex their story needs to be to explain it. (Of course, there are always exceptions to this.)
Age is another factor that plays into the significance of a character's history. A young kid fresh off the farm has much less backstory to contend with than, say, a fifty year-old war veteran who surely had to have experienced a few things that helped to shape them into the individual they have become. It would seem strange to give that average farm kid an overly elaborate history jam-packed with action and superfluous details, just as much as it would seem off to leave that veteran's history totally uneventful or lacking in substance.
As has been mentioned a few times already though: my character's history is more for my own benefit than it is any one else's. Sure, it might come to be useful for people who happen to get close enough/dig deep enough, but for the most part I'm the only one that needs it.Â
Additionally, even when I write profiles or what-not for character databases, I make a point to omit some (sometimes even most) of the sensitive or important information so as to avoid killing the mystery. Of course, I try to include "hooks" so speak in both the writing and the story to hopefully grab people's curiosity-- like perhaps an extension of a major life event into 'present' day to play out-- but if you want to know the details, you'll likely have to try finding out ICly and over time by involving yourself in that character's story. Even then, however, I have played countless characters in RPs-past whom actually never had their backstories explained or revealed ICly-- and sometimes, it's better that way.
Namely--- I try to come up with a personality I'd like them to portray, a specific skill or two I'd like them to be proficient at (or even horrible at), and maybe a certain career or calling. Then, once that is all said and done, I use the history itself to explain the why's and how's behind those traits.
For this purpose, history is incredibly important to me-- but that doesn't necessarily mean that I let the history control the character. Rather, I use their past as a way to augment and round out their present into something dimensional for me to work with in RP.Â
As a result of this, the history is a direct reflection of the character's personality and vice versa-- a character with more complex behavioral patterns should naturally have a more complex backstory to explain why they are the way they are. Conversely, the less complex a personality, the less complex their story needs to be to explain it. (Of course, there are always exceptions to this.)
Age is another factor that plays into the significance of a character's history. A young kid fresh off the farm has much less backstory to contend with than, say, a fifty year-old war veteran who surely had to have experienced a few things that helped to shape them into the individual they have become. It would seem strange to give that average farm kid an overly elaborate history jam-packed with action and superfluous details, just as much as it would seem off to leave that veteran's history totally uneventful or lacking in substance.
As has been mentioned a few times already though: my character's history is more for my own benefit than it is any one else's. Sure, it might come to be useful for people who happen to get close enough/dig deep enough, but for the most part I'm the only one that needs it.Â
Additionally, even when I write profiles or what-not for character databases, I make a point to omit some (sometimes even most) of the sensitive or important information so as to avoid killing the mystery. Of course, I try to include "hooks" so speak in both the writing and the story to hopefully grab people's curiosity-- like perhaps an extension of a major life event into 'present' day to play out-- but if you want to know the details, you'll likely have to try finding out ICly and over time by involving yourself in that character's story. Even then, however, I have played countless characters in RPs-past whom actually never had their backstories explained or revealed ICly-- and sometimes, it's better that way.
![[Image: mO8aEaH.jpg]](http://i.imgur.com/mO8aEaH.jpg)
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