Forums / Roleplaying / The Wall of Knowledge

As you walk into the Roleplayers Academy, you notice a very large magical wall in the main room.  Upon it are words of wisdom and aid to those who need help in the area of roleplaying.  Lessons from teachers such as Scientist, Deallus, or even Shezmu are there.  Old lessons from Septim and also the passing advice from students and visitors.  The magical wall records only roleplaying knowledge and cannot be tampered with in any way.  This is the Wall of Knowledge.  All teachers of the Academy are encouraged to give their own advice and impart some knowledge onto the other people visiting the Academy.
______________________________________________

1)Character Development - Characters do not always stay the same throughout a roleplay.  They have mental and physical improvements due to the things they do.  It is also helpful to describe the physical characteristics of your characters.  Height, build, hair color, eye color, armor, weapons, or even scars.  These things make your character appear in the readers mind and can make them much more interesting than a generic warrior who seems to be faceless due to the lack of work put into them.

Deallus Tips
You can be as descriptive as you want with your character.  You can be very general, or you can bring your character to life. 
Doing simple things like describing your character's height, body build, hair color, eye color, what kind of armor or clothing he/she wears, the weapons they use, or the scars they have recieved from combat or accidents. 

You can describe your character's personality. 
Are they brave in battle or do they prefer to keep out of sight?
Are they good leaders or followers?
Are they secretive or very open about themselves?
Are they treacherous or very honorable and trustworthy?

You can base the characters after yourself if you want.  The choice is yours.  If you want your character to develope over time, that brings them to life even more. 
Most characters do not always stay the same. 
They could originally start off as cowardly, but slowly become very brave as they become experienced or older. 
They could be greatly affected by an event in their lives that improvements their personality. 

The choices are endless.  It is best not to make your character godlike and unbeatable as this takes away from how "real" they can seem.  Characters who can suffere defeat, require help from others, or become wounded are ones that are more readily believeable.  Those that somehow can slaughter numerous enemies in an instant and never recieve a scratch are frowned upon.  I tend to refer to this type of character as having godmode characteristics.  This also applies for characters who can use many weapons with master skill.  It simply hurts roleplaying in my honest opinion and the character should be changed.

Pets are another fun thing you can join up with your character.  They can be used for combat, scouting, or just for companionship.  As stated above, it is not always in the best interest to have a pet that is far superior to anything else.  Equality and balance are key things to look for.

~Deallus

Septims Tips

Prince Valan Septim Report 12/30/2008 2:47:12 PM

"Deallus is right. My characters almost always evolve over time. In Birth of a Legend, my character started out as a noble city guard, then became an elite soldier, then an Imperial Assassin, then a revolutionary, and finally...a vile Emperor, but in the end, he desired his son to live a different life than he did. Not all knights remain pure forever...and not all villains are pure evil..."

*Hirgon wanders in, reads the wall, and scratches his head for a moment.  He goes off for a while, and then comes back in and tacks a post-it note amendment up on the wall next to Septim's description of a "Good Character"*

If you really want to keep people interested in your character, and are planning on developing a long-term storyline, in my opinion it is a good idea to give your good character a flaw, or in some cases several flaws.  It opens up many possibilities for roleplaying, and is more believable than a perfect character.  It also leaves room for character development as you interact with other characters...
-The unsolicited opinion of an novice roleplayer