(no subject)

[aliseadae]

Today I wrote the beginning of a story which is not focused around a shiny setting for once. It has characters that I understand! This breaks the pattern I was noticing which is that I have troubles writing about characters and not just writing about really awesome settings. (Though in one story the setting will gain characters. The other has a couple but the story isn't exactly focused on them. I suppose it could be if I wrote more of it. They are still both very setting-focused stories, though.)

I noticed also that I am bad at actually creating a character for games instead of just thinking of how shiny the world is. I'm doing okay at living world Exalted character creation but that is because Robbie asks good probing questions.

Does anyone have tips on writing or creating characters? I have a feeling that I should just practice but if anyone has any good ideas on how to practice I'd appreciate it. I might just start creating characters in my idle time. These characters would not be actual characters for a game though I might set them in the worlds. I would not be paying attention to character sheets because my focus is gaining ease in the main creation. Once I have ease in gaining ideas, I can apply these ideas to specific games or specific stories.

Comments

in which I ramble about process.

[notadoor.livejournal.com]

Not sure if by "setting" you mean "worldbuilding" (fantastic elements in the world, rather than, say, the physical nature of the story's surroundings), but if you do, you can also use that as a toehold in character creation.

The last short story I finished started with an image of a gold-and-jewels house on a riverbank getting eaten by snakes.

From that image, I knew three things:
1) I was in a fairy tale. But not one I'd ever seen before.
2) I was in India.
3) My main character was an architect.

So then I had to figure out what an architect was doing in a fairy tale. And once I knew that I had the story.


Another story I wrote started because I wanted to write a midnight chase scene where a yew tree uproots itself and starts running through a graveyard.

The question I began with was "what kind of idiots would get chased through a graveyard by a yew tree in the middle of the night?" And the answer I came up with was "teenage boys trying to do magic."


Those are both events/specific images, more than general setting. But I think a useful tool is to ask "who would be in this place, and why?" And then ask questions that extend from those two points (what kind of magic are they trying to do? what's their relationship to each other? where does the yew tree come in?) Or just write scenes with them, and see what comes up.

/rambling

Re: in which I ramble about process.

[aliseadae]

Your second story sounds similar to the story I mentioned as having a couple characters. They did come from the question "why are they there?" I needed them to stop in a specific small town and I did ask who would do that. As it turns out, they are on a road trip and one of the characters likes looking at the sort of thing advertised at the side of the road (the world's biggest ball of string, that sort of tourist trap).

[carve037.livejournal.com]

I think it's hard getting a character idea on the spot. I get my best ideas when I'm just thinking, somewhere else. So, when you have an idea like that, I'd consider just writing it down, before it floats away. That way you have something to draw off of when you need it.

[far-wanderer.livejournal.com]

My usual method is to get a basic idea of the function I want a character to play, then start combining pieces of people and other characters that I find interesting. By about the fourth influence a character typically starts to take on a unique identity of their own, and I can build from there.
Often this will start with a single aspect of a character that I see and think "I want to write (or play, if it's for a game) that trait" and then I'll pull in other influences to differentiate them from the primary source.

So basically: find a hole, come up with a very basic concept to fill that hole, and then start pulling in extra pieces from other sources until you feel the character shift and become something unique.

[mischief03.livejournal.com]

Write bios and obituaries. Do quick little three paragraph descriptions of people and include something that makes them unique. As morbid as it sounds, try to come up with a reason you'd want to go to the funeral without ever meeting the person.

Start conversations with imaginary people in your head. As long as you don't develop schizophrenia, you'll have to explain why you wash dishes instead of using paper ones, or why you have real paper books instead of plastic broadsheets or how a shower works which leads to interesting characters and setting.

I had another one, but I forgot it. Darn. I'll post again if it comes back to me.