Sorry, assumptions. :P RPS is Real Person Slash, where you're writing about the actors rather than the characters they play. Or some people write about musicians or sports figures or whomever.
I have no idea why I didn't put "original fanfiction characters", but that's what I meant.
Ahh, OK. No, I've never taken a character I wrote first in a solo story and brought him or her into an RPG. If I thought the character would fit into the RPG storyline I was writing then I'd probably do so, rather than making up a new OC just to be new, but it's never come up.
And I've had friends who write nothing but OCs complain about bad OCs in RPGs. I feel it's really not about the character's status - canon, one time mention in canon, OC - but the situation.
But that's the point, I think, that it doesn't matter if the character is major or minor or a one-shot or not in canon at all. What's important is how the writer writes him or her, and a bad writer is going to be a problem no matter what. A really good writer can create a well-developed OC and fit it smoothly into the story, whereas a bad writer can take a character for which there are six books or six TV seasons' worth of canon to refer to and completely mess up anyway. IMO when there's a problem in an RPG the fault is with the writer, not the character.
I think some groups truly want to be inclusive, but plotwise it doesn't work. And I think there's also the matter of character interest, which isn't necessarily their fault - if you want to be Hagrid in a group where the rest of the members think he's the Potterverse Jar Jar Binks, it's going to be hard. That said, I think a good group mod finds a way to work with it.
It sounds like we're talking two different things, here. If the problem is that the main plotline of the game simply doesn't have room for this or that character -- and really, you can only have so many major characters in a single storyline -- then that's a different problem from Jane wanting to play Hagrid and the mod being good with that but all the other players not wanting to write their characters interacting with Hagrid.
I do feel it's usually best to do so with mods... however, sometimes people don't make it possible.
If the mods know and the person causing so much havoc is still around, then yes, it becomes problematic. When someone has so thoroughly messed over a number of people, individuals who don't know each other, over a period of time and the mods haven't done anything, then it gets to the point where you just have to post some warning signs. It sucks pretty thoroughly, though, and I'll only do it if watching some clueless new player wander into the tiger trap sucks a lot more. :/ Ideally the mods would handle it but it's not an ideal world, unfortunately.
I still live with my parents, and one time in the middle of a roleplay, my Mom walked in and decided we were going somewhere in ten minutes. I had two options: say no and offend her, or tell my friend I'd have to RP that night.
See now, to me, that's covered in the "real life good excuses" section I mentioned above. If you're living under a parent's roof and have to keep them happy then a parental demand is IMO a good reason for leaving in the middle of an RP session. But you told your friend you were going and why, right? That's what makes all the difference.
I've RPed with people who did not tell me they were leaving the computer before they did it, who just took off and left me and our other writing partner hanging for forty minutes or an hour, wondering if she was typing, if she'd seen the last paragraph and knew it was her turn. Eventually, when she hasn't responded to several inquiries in the chat window, it became clear she was actually gone for whatever reason and we started worrying that something dire had happened, her baby'd gotten hurt or the stove had exploded or whatever. Then to have her wander back in all that time later and say, "Oh, the phone rang," or something, that's just incredibly rude.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2006-10-20 09:07 pm (UTC)Sorry, assumptions. :P RPS is Real Person Slash, where you're writing about the actors rather than the characters they play. Or some people write about musicians or sports figures or whomever.
I have no idea why I didn't put "original fanfiction characters", but that's what I meant.
Ahh, OK. No, I've never taken a character I wrote first in a solo story and brought him or her into an RPG. If I thought the character would fit into the RPG storyline I was writing then I'd probably do so, rather than making up a new OC just to be new, but it's never come up.
And I've had friends who write nothing but OCs complain about bad OCs in RPGs. I feel it's really not about the character's status - canon, one time mention in canon, OC - but the situation.
But that's the point, I think, that it doesn't matter if the character is major or minor or a one-shot or not in canon at all. What's important is how the writer writes him or her, and a bad writer is going to be a problem no matter what. A really good writer can create a well-developed OC and fit it smoothly into the story, whereas a bad writer can take a character for which there are six books or six TV seasons' worth of canon to refer to and completely mess up anyway. IMO when there's a problem in an RPG the fault is with the writer, not the character.
I think some groups truly want to be inclusive, but plotwise it doesn't work. And I think there's also the matter of character interest, which isn't necessarily their fault - if you want to be Hagrid in a group where the rest of the members think he's the Potterverse Jar Jar Binks, it's going to be hard. That said, I think a good group mod finds a way to work with it.
It sounds like we're talking two different things, here. If the problem is that the main plotline of the game simply doesn't have room for this or that character -- and really, you can only have so many major characters in a single storyline -- then that's a different problem from Jane wanting to play Hagrid and the mod being good with that but all the other players not wanting to write their characters interacting with Hagrid.
I do feel it's usually best to do so with mods... however, sometimes people don't make it possible.
If the mods know and the person causing so much havoc is still around, then yes, it becomes problematic. When someone has so thoroughly messed over a number of people, individuals who don't know each other, over a period of time and the mods haven't done anything, then it gets to the point where you just have to post some warning signs. It sucks pretty thoroughly, though, and I'll only do it if watching some clueless new player wander into the tiger trap sucks a lot more. :/ Ideally the mods would handle it but it's not an ideal world, unfortunately.
I still live with my parents, and one time in the middle of a roleplay, my Mom walked in and decided we were going somewhere in ten minutes. I had two options: say no and offend her, or tell my friend I'd have to RP that night.
See now, to me, that's covered in the "real life good excuses" section I mentioned above. If you're living under a parent's roof and have to keep them happy then a parental demand is IMO a good reason for leaving in the middle of an RP session. But you told your friend you were going and why, right? That's what makes all the difference.
I've RPed with people who did not tell me they were leaving the computer before they did it, who just took off and left me and our other writing partner hanging for forty minutes or an hour, wondering if she was typing, if she'd seen the last paragraph and knew it was her turn. Eventually, when she hasn't responded to several inquiries in the chat window, it became clear she was actually gone for whatever reason and we started worrying that something dire had happened, her baby'd gotten hurt or the stove had exploded or whatever. Then to have her wander back in all that time later and say, "Oh, the phone rang," or something, that's just incredibly rude.
[Continued on Next Rock...]