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Connor

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Posts posted by Connor

    [PRIMER]Roleplaying 101: Writing builds character.

    in General

    Posted

    To support this: One problem is that in RPs, and, less commonly, fanfiction, is that appearance of a character is left down to the reader's visualisation because the work tends to be mostly writing, meaning that you almost never get a picture that shows the person's appearance; this means that defining a character through clothing and appearance is especially hard when it comes to writing; focusing more on who they are, and what they're like is what leads the reader to identify them when it comes to written work, meaning that the most appearance tends to do is apply either extravagance or simplicity to enhance the character, as mentioned. Of course, if Connor has an argument against this, I'm going to be the first in line to listen.

    I suppose you have a point, as many FF writers tend to go for the plot over the detail and character development (if they're not balls-deep in writing lemons). I still stand by though, that if written correctly, a character can be defined by their clothes. For instance, characters that don't talk, or talk very little (can't think of that blue-haired girl from Familiar of Zero, although she's a bad example) can be defined by what they show up in. Although, I am just pulling hairs at this point, as people actually USING this are very far and few in between, so I guess I must concede.

    It's not impossible for a character to be unflawed; after all, you're the person who creates it. A person doesn't have to create a character that's flawed in order to make him/her good (although I will admit that for beginner writers that's a lot harder to do). It's possible to explore the possibilities with an unflawed character, either by creating flaws in future development or through experimentation with their character as a result of being flawless; however, I will admit that it's incredibly hard to pull off as differing ideals from different creators can easily lead to characters becoming Sues, or just being flawed in the eyes of another person.

    EDIT: Yeah, I will admit that this last point is a far bigger stretch for beginner writers, which is what this guide is made for.

    And, as I read this, I again realize that this was for beginning writers, and I look at how far off the handle I went. However, I believe that creating a character without flaws (and without flaws in their backstory, as that could lead to confusion) is the point in creating unflawed characters to begin with. Intoducing a character that seems perfect would lead many people astray in both interaction in RP's and whether or not people decide to stay and read the rest of the FF. By introducing a flaw to begin with, no matter how small, the reader can see that the character ISN'T perfect, and that there may be more flaws in the future. By creating them as the ideal image of someone, the reader has no reason to believe that the image will be tarnished in any way.

    [PRIMER]Roleplaying 101: Writing builds character.

    in General

    Posted

    Ah, that last bit wasn't meant to be read with malicious intent, so I apologize if that's what it came out to look like. I also apologize if I came out to be too aggressive, but as Will was reading out many of those RP character posts (and after reading one too many extremely subpar stories on ff) I was irritable and took it out via the internet like any angry computer man would. As for that last part, being

    In conclusion, if this were a bit more generally speaking and not so much your style of writing, it would be well thought out and written.

    I didn't, by any means, mean that your particular style was bad, everyone has their own style and it separates authors into who they are. It's just my opinion that as a guide, much of the advice is taken from the writing community as a whole, rather from one style. But as you said, it was simply to assist people in their endeavors to create better RP characters, rather than writing as a whole, so my point is moot in that sense. I do hope that I haven't truly offended you in any way, and if I have let me know how to make it up to you.

    Quickedit : Storm = Amethyst, cuz AmethystStorm and shit

    [PRIMER]Roleplaying 101: Writing builds character.

    in General

    Posted

    K, so by coming over to Will's dorm and watching him browse threads for something to read, we came across this. I, being an avid fanfiction writer (and a damn good one at that), was naturally curious as to what point you would bring up. Thus, I read this. And I was disappointed on more than one account, which I will get into since I genuinely want to know what mindset you had in writing this up. That being said, I'm going to bulletpoint this shit so that it's easy for you to reply to.

    .5 The title. Dubbing this "Fanfiction 101" wasn't exactly the best title for it, as much of your points on character development are based on Roleplaying characters. That being said, I'm not exactly sure what a better name would be, but if your intent was to make a guide for RP or FF, a more specific name would have been appreciated.

    1.

    First, let's think about what we want in a good character. We want a believable, well-fleshed-out character which stands out from the crowd. We want our character to be interesting and unique.

    While I can agree with your first statement, that being that the character needs to be believable and thought out, having them stand out or be interesting to other people does not make an objectively GOOD character. It simply makes them easier to develop, and gives the author a little cushion of safety to fall back on, should someone imply or put forward that the character is completely arbitrary, the author can state that the character is "unique" or "one of a kind". I'm not stating that this way is bad either, put simply, both ways work. They aren't required to have a certain level of "uniqueness" in order to be good. They can be average in every way, but still be a good character based on how they react with others in their environment.

    2.

    2) What's in a name?

    Once again, why does the name matter that much? Or rather, I should say, why should underwhelming names be unused? While I agree that names that take it a bit too far should be used sparingly, something as simple as "Bob" or "Jeff" are perfectly fine. This goes back to your point that characters should be interesting in all aspects, while I argue that simplistic characters and names can have just as powerful an impact

    3.

    The best characters are those that look just like the average person, but have strong personalities and unique personality quirks.

    Characters can be defined by their clothing. Popular manga/anime enforces that, and since fanfiction/roleplaying derived from that, it shouldn't be something completely left out. That being said, both extravagant AND plain clothing can be equally as important.

    I'm going to take a quick break here to state the thing that comes to mind at this point, which is that this isn't a general guide for writing fanfiction. This is YOUR OUTLINE for character development. Having read through much more than what I've commented about, this is extremely biased towards the hate towards Sues. A general guideline would be more what Storm put after this was thrown up initially, just a bit more detail thrown in.

    4.

    A character's personality and unique quirks is what establishes the character as a good or a bad one. Make your character interesting, give it a unique personality. "Sarcastic" is not a unique trait, neither is "lazy". "Has aspirations to be a florist" is. The best traits are those that go with a common profession to make a character stand out. Is your character a detective? Give him a speech disorder to impede his communication of deductions.

    OK, this one legitimately made me a bit angry. ANY traits from anyone makes a unique character, not what you deem to be a "good" or "bad" trait. What makes a solid character is the fact that they HAVE a personality. Both being sarcastic and lazy can make just as good a character as someone who is large on chivalry and justice, or intellect and knowledge. It's how you build the character from that point is how they become who they are. Being a florist has absolutely nothing to do with how they act towards their crush, or authority, or when faced with moral choices, etc. Their traits and quirks are what would influence them to want to be a florist, which leads to character development. Also, you don't need to give them something to directly impact their desire to be a certain thing. IE don't need a speech impediment if they want to be a detective/lawyer, don't need to be uncoordinated when they want to be a professional sports player, etc, because rarely will people have the drive to push them past those problems.

    5.

    5) The power within

    Your definition of what's Mary Sue is pretty extreme here. Someone THAT overpowered seems like they would be put in as a satirical character, rather than a serious one. However, your next suggestions of "balance" once again seem too over the top for me. Having a character know a multitude of fighting moves is fine, you don't need to dumb him down to the point of uselessness, because that completely negates his good parts. Also, it is illogical to think in the long run, for two reasons. One, if he took that much time to learn fighting styles, learning isn't simply moving through the katas and becoming physically strong. To use the fighting style you HAVE to know how to counter your opponent, due to spars and practicing. So, if he were 14 fighting styles deep, how would he still know how to not counter his opponents? The second reason this doesn't follow logically, is, say that he were literally that dumb to not know how to counter simple attacks. How would he have the intelligence to even LEARN 14 fighting styles? Many practitioners don't master styles for years, so how could this dumbass learn 14 and not know how to counter. Also, living god? Really. A living god. In a 'guide' that crucifies Mary Sues.

    No comment.

    6.

    Enter the Mary Sue; the OC archetype despised by all. Nobody likes a Mary Sue, and for good reason: She is too perfect. A Mary Sue is unbelievable, has no room to grow/develop, tends to have terrible characterisation, and can solve all conflicts by flipping her hair and winking.

    Now, while I can agree that MAIN characters being Sue can make for a dull story, they aren't so transparent as to have no development whatsoever. As an example, look at Sword Art Online. The main character, Kirito, is objectively a Sue. He starts out with only a marginal amount of knowledge over all other players, and yet he goes through the entire series solo'ing what took entire groups of players only a few levels lower than him. He does this the entire series, obtaining several miracles in order to continue winning, both the game and hearts of people around him. Would you argue that he has no character development?

    While Sues can, for the most part, be boring and can completely kill the story, they aren't ALWAYS bad.

    7.

    6a) Nobody's Perfect.

    Once again, you're being too extreme in your taking away of good traits of the character. If you're making a main character (even someone to RP as), the POINT is for your character to have something that sets him apart from the rest. If it's a character that has an extremely strong point, but another that cripples him to oblivion, that is more defined as a supporting role, since their strong point is extremely situational.

    6b) Extremism must DIE.

    Characters not being to be ABSOLUTELY good or ABSOLUTELY bad is, to me, just plain wrong. Do you not think, that in this world of over 5 billion people, that there isn't a SINGLE person who has no guilty pleasures, or not a single beacon of goodness inside them? Insane serial killers typically have no good traits, they lived their lives with problems, and went out (and took pleasure) in hurting and killing others. On the other hand, many nuns and religious clergy give up a good deal in order to help others. I'm sure, that in only these TWO examples, there is at least one in both situations that have absolutely nothing good or absolutely nothing bad on their minds at time of death (respectively)

    6c) Sob stories make me cry.

    Once again, you're looking at it from a plain, standard point of view. Stories as bad as losing your family, home, and friends and having to live off the streets are common in other countries. Sure, not that much here, but for the purpose of FANFICTION (hello title) they can be good tools to make both a setting and a plot.

    6d) Poketalking OP.

    For the most part, I can agree with this wholeheartedly. I hate people who give their character traits that aren't explained, simply to give them "depth"

    In conclusion, if this were a bit more generally speaking and not so much your style of writing, it would be well thought out and written. I especially enjoyed the lack of grammatical and spelling errors, as there is so much of that shit on FF.net that I want to put my head through a glass pane window. Feel free to argue me on any of these topics, as these are my opinions.

    Shoutout to Blez and bestfriendkaru

    Ranting about mad

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    I'm pretty sure I'm the oldest on here and I understand what you mean about this being the internet and all that stuff about having opinions and freedom of language and all that. I really do. And really, there's a lot of maturity to be found around here.

    But that being said, I have to tell you that I can't count the number of times I've been talking about stuff and then realize... We have quite a few really young people on here. 12, 13, 14, and so on. Not all of you guys are 17 and above. And sometimes it comes out- in the posts I read, the drama I hear about... Not everyone here is a pokemon player from the old school r/b g/s days enjoying a favorite game series but some really are youngsters who do any number of immature things. So sometimes I have to reel myself in and keep that in mind.

    I do miss the more relaxed, mature chats we had, but the member base isn't all as old as it used to be. And some of them are the ones trying to troll and spam and do all sorts of shit that's a waste of our time and patience. Not to say that mini-modding isn't a problem. I've been tracking that as a concern since before Ame went and posted up all the new rules.

    It seems to me that the heart of the matter is, the server population is still in fluctuation. Until the population stabilizes, there's still gonna be a lot of people who aren't familiar with us and vice versa. We have a certain standard to keep, but we also need to work on flexibility. Not every small infraction is warn worthy, while some people obviously need to be shown the door right away. Some of us here need more experience distinguishing between the two. Give it time and it will happen.

    That is the answer I was looking for, a nice solid response about the concern and action (or rather lack therof, and just waiting it out) that is to be taken. And I suppose you're right, but when that population does indeed even out I hope that it can go back to how it used to be. Dem good old days

    Ranting about mad

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    High regards to all who posted, and the fact that you all make sense. And I understand that some issues, such as rape and drugs and all that REALLY controversial stuff NEED to be filtered out (such as racism), but like SexyHarkSexy said, the minimodding is just out of hand. Glad to see people actually taking the time to look at it though :D appreciate it a ton

    Ranting about mad

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    Before I start, I just wanna say that I think people are cool. Nice, enjoyable people. Secondly, if you disagree with me, feel free to say so in whatever manner you like. Curse at me, degrade me, whatever, because it's the INTERNET and I don't CARE about what people SAY on the INTERNET.

    Which brings me to my rant. When I first joined the site (a good year and a half ago) it was everyone making fun of everyone in GOOD SPORT. Everyone had fun with it, and if anyone was ACTUALLY offended, they talked it over with the person and it was all fine. It held a nice mature atmosphere, while still being a fun place for the younger crowd. In recent weeks, I have only been on a few times, so maybe it's all coincidental, but I have noticed an EXTREME change in the attitude of the people. Not only is it so focused on being kid friendly that 4KIDS entertainment is taking pages out of it's book, but everyone is just so sensitive to things that previous people didn't even bat an eyelash at. I admit, the new rules (new to me anyway) are set in place for a reason, so everyone can have a nice enjoyable time, and I totally understand that. But when part of that fun time involves butting heads with fellow players with some crude language, I feel that it limits them on their options of "fun". Now I'm not saying that I am part of that minority that enjoys cursing at people to feel great, but when I'm messing around with my friends in the chat and I get told "rule #" by some guy who can't take it, it's slightly demoralizing. Not just because it burst my bubble when I wasn't even trying to be offensive in the least, but because they actually CARE enough to give me a, warning or something? "Don't do it again or I'll sic these authority figures on you!" ?

    It seems to me that the server used to be like Dave and Busters. A friendly atmosphere where those more mature to not take anything seriously could mess around and have a nice time, while still looking kid friendly and such. But it got so severely limited in the enjoyment that you can take that it seems more like a Chuck E Cheese now, where the younger crowd have tons of fun with the simplest of things, and if you so much as utter one obscenity you have some parent breathing down your neck about tainting their child or whatnot. The point that I'm trying to get at is, if people are so sensitive to this kind of language, why are they on the internet? The government regulates television, radio, and whatever else it can get at, but the internet is so vast that they can't control it all. It is one of the only things left where people can leave their raw, uncensored opinions on the screen in black and white, without some higher authority slapping them on the wrist and telling them they can't do it. Now these opinions may not be good, they can be completely wrong, but the point is that person is able to tell it without holding back. Getting back to my original point, why are people that are this sensitive to this material just not learning to cope with it? When so much of it is prominent, why put yourself in harms way? I don't know, maybe I'm missing the entire point or maybe I'm just being a stubborn ass and missing the old days, but before I end this let me give an example of what I mean.

    In the few times I went on in the past few weeks, 3 of the 4 I was threatened to be told on (or something). What essentially happened was that I would be talking to an old friend of mine on the server, and someone didn't like what I was saying apparently. However, instead of directly confronting me in a PM about it or something mature in that matter, they instead started asking auth to simply ban me from the server.

    wat

    The fact that this happened three separate times, with a week or so in between them and with 3 separate people, scares me a little. Can people be this afraid of what is said on a digital screen that they still have to go running to the nearest adult figure to stop the bad man from telling his opinion? Why didn't they just ask why? Or ask if I was joking? Or better yet, just IGNORE it. I don't have the slightest clue to any of my questions, because they simply baffle me. I was told in my youth that if someone made fun of you, or something of the sort, to just ignore it. Because if you ignore it, nothing happens, besides the person losing breathe for a lost cause. I was also taught everyone had a right to an opinion, and that we should be able to speak it freely no matter what.

    Well, there we go. I got all that off my chest. And maybe some nice do-gooder has some legit answers to my questions, to help me better understand why the server went the way it did. Because I'm tired of people screaming rules at me and threatening to tell their internet mommy that I hurt their internet feelings.

    post-100-0-26787400-1336023658_thumb.jpg

    What do you look like?

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    I wonder... Would my fans like to know what I look like behind the veil...?

    Go for it!

    Look at the conversation going on in the posts before yours; is that really a good idea in a crowd like this...?

    Sure, why not... As if Ame would allow that << >>

    And to de-derail this topic, quite possibly the only thing I have going for me: the eyes~

    ...THE EYES!!! o Oo

    League Registration

    in Pokémon Fan Club

    Posted

    Let's try this...

    4Eyes (Claydol): Shiny
    Rapid Spin
    Stealth Rox
    Earth Power
    Psychic


    Wut (Flygon): Non-shiny
    Draco Meteor
    Earthquake
    Fire Blast
    U-Turn


    Fireballs (Ninetails): Shiny
    Fire Blast
    Hypnosis
    Energy Ball
    Nasty Plot


    FlamingBurdz (Charizard): Non-shiny
    Roost
    Fire Blast
    Hidden Power (Ele.)
    AirSlash


    TheBigOne (Milotic): Non-shiny
    Ice Beam
    Recover
    Boil Over
    Toxic


    MahBoi (Scizor): Non-shiny
    Bullet Punch
    BrickBreak
    U-Turn
    Night Slash


    Trainer Card Colors: Blue and Silver
    Sprite 80 pl0x

    Apples to Apples?

    in Onyx Arcade

    Posted

    [quote name='Will' post='8429' date='Dec 30 2010, 12:09 AM']Smooth, you say...?

    [img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_BJjJ5EGTBC4/TG_yURksqfI/AAAAAAAAATw/_TR5klQl69g/s1600/keith_stone2.jpg[/img][/quote]
    Yes. Very.

    The New Pokémon

    in Pokémon Fan Club

    Posted

    [quote name='NoGoodBoyo' post='4556' date='Sep 16 2010, 02:23 PM'][url="http://www.serebii.net/blackwhite/pokemon.shtml"]http://www.serebii.net/blackwhite/pokemon.shtml[/url]

    These all look horrible.

    Seriously. Maggyo?

    I wish for the days when we had Bidoof.[/quote]
    I quite agree. Not on the fact Bidoof looked good, but more so on the fact that they're now over-exaggerating the pokemon. They don't even look cool anymore, except for the main legendaries in Black/White. It seems like they're just trying to squeeze out too much complicated body structure. Look at Pikachu. It was a yellow rat. That zapped people. Best pokemon ever. Where's the simplicity in all these new pokemon? There is none. NONE I SAY.
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