Experiences Every Possible Problem associated with putting a Personality Section in your Application Skeleton

[Murdergurl]

Yeah, I think this is for basic people who haven't got around to the whole "have my character act like a person" bit yet. Which is fine, if you're coming from a gaming angle rather than a writing angle maybe that is something you need to be introduced to. But it certainly doesn't seem relevant for online text based RPing.

I've noticed that a lot of "gaming" elements have made their way into free-writing roleplay. Like, a lot of people want to base their character tropes off of MMO roles and such. And even if the RP is not at all related to D&D, the classes still prevail to show themselves as what the character's jobs and background entail. I've even seen where freeform and completely stat-less RPs have a CS where characters start naming their combat moves and powers as though it was a character menu on a console. I don't really care for it. I think it's kinda dumb and overstated, tbh. But to each their own.

 

[Idea]

The way I see it, most problems people have with personality sections comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what they are. One of the most common examples if "the personality is too restricting" or "well, my character will change over time". If I may, I will liken the personality section of a character sheet to a photograph: It captures a moment in time with the focus and some of the immediate surroundings. An accurate depiction of that moment is there, but that doesn't mean that time never goes past that photo, though as one might imagine it is not completely different in the very next milisecond either. The borders of the photo also don't mean there is nothing beyond them, just that what is within them does exist.

The personality section is intended to be like that: It has a focus, the parts of how your character behaves that are meant to be most representative of them and who they are. Who they are, present tense. It’s representative of them, but peculiar circumstances can bring different sides of a person out and there’s always more details that can be fleshed out. Character development isn’t hindered by the character presently being a given way, nor does the personality section in any way demand that the character remain fixed like that forever, it only asks the character be roleplayed as stated until the organic effect of the circumstances result in development.

If anything, I would argue the opposite of what many do: I believe if you don’t have an idea of who the character is, or if you can’t portray who the character is, then you cannot portray their change either. If your change is going from having nothing properly defined to having something properly defined, then the character didn’t change, they just started actually being a character.

Of course, one could argue “look, we may already have the character idea on our head”. That may be true, but I would respond that if it is, then what’s the big deal about writing it down? If the idea in your head is solid, then even if it doesn’t come out perfect you should be able to put it in words. If you can’t put it in words, then how can I trust you even really thought about how the character is supposed to be and act, let alone that you have a developed idea of them? If the roleplay doesn't have particularly fast posts or if you for any reason need a break or a hiatus, will you really still have that idea for the character in your head, will it not be blurred because it is no longer fresh?

For a long time, especially in my early roleplay years, I've seen many examples of people who even several posts into the roleplay couldn't tell you anything concrete about their characters. There are many players who do have their characters and can roleplay pretty solid characters without a defined idea of them at first- something I will address in a moment- but I've also seen, especially amongst the less experienced crowd, just how easily one can be tempted to use a poorly defined personality as an excuse to make their character change on a dime, to whatever is most convenient for them in the situation. This, the way I see it, is the opposite of what should happen. Personalities are meant to be inconvenient, personalities are meant to interact in unique ways and have clashes and directions of their own- not follow neatly whatever the plot hook is or whatever gives players a mechanical advantage. And when you GM and see those personalities, and see just how many people can't grasp the basic concept of a character flaw, or have personalities that are utterly meaningless because they speak only of extreme circumstances or because they are entirely defined by what others think of the character or because they are 90% made of contradictions....

Indeed, the personality section can serve some pretty important OOC purposes in my opinion. They can serve as an information bank or frame of reference for the player that made them. They can be used by the GM and players to establish organic situations that fit the characters and still achieve their narrative purpose, such as getting two characters to start off on the right foot using shared likes (which is why I like to include likes, dislikes and fears into my CS templates). They can be used by GMs to push back poorly thought out characters and at least have the player rethink them. As for how much is needed, well, I would say that depends on trust. I think a defined character is needed, but I don't think one needs to be that expansive, just to give the gist of how the character acts generally. I would argue a lot more leeway can be given on these things if the GM knows enough about the player to be sure they actually do at least have the character properly defined in their head.

I do recognize that there is one character method which falls outside of what I talked about so far, this is people who make characters best by playing them out and seeing what fits and works best for them. This is an entirely legitimate approach, even if I'm 100% certain there are a lot more people who say they prefer this method simply because they think it means they don't have to actually come up with the character at all or because it sounds easier. Even so, I think this is a case that falls back into what I was saying earlier about trust. As a GM I would still need to be able to trust that you are actually working on such a method and that you will have a defined character sooner rather than later with it. Otherwise what you're roleplaying isn't a character, it's a puppet.

 

[Crayons]

The way I see it, most problems people have with personality sections comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what they are. One of the most common examples if "the personality is too restricting" or "well, my character will change over time". If I may, I will liken the personality section of a character sheet to a photograph: It captures a moment in time with the focus and some of the immediate surroundings. An accurate depiction of that moment is there, but that doesn't mean that time never goes past that photo, though as one might imagine it is not completely different in the very next milisecond either. The borders of the photo also don't mean there is nothing beyond them, just that what is within them does exist.

The personality section is intended to be like that: It has a focus, the parts of how your character behaves that are meant to be most representative of them and who they are. Who they are, present tense. It’s representative of them, but peculiar circumstances can bring different sides of a person out and there’s always more details that can be fleshed out. Character development isn’t hindered by the character presently being a given way, nor does the personality section in any way demand that the character remain fixed like that forever, it only asks the character be roleplayed as stated until the organic effect of the circumstances result in development.

If anything, I would argue the opposite of what many do: I believe if you don’t have an idea of who the character is, or if you can’t portray who the character is, then you cannot portray their change either. If your change is going from having nothing properly defined to having something properly defined, then the character didn’t change, they just started actually being a character.

Of course, one could argue “look, we may already have the character idea on our head”. That may be true, but I would respond that if it is, then what’s the big deal about writing it down? If the idea in your head is solid, then even if it doesn’t come out perfect you should be able to put it in words. If you can’t put it in words, then how can I trust you even really thought about how the character is supposed to be and act, let alone that you have a developed idea of them? If the roleplay doesn't have particularly fast posts or if you for any reason need a break or a hiatus, will you really still have that idea for the character in your head, will it not be blurred because it is no longer fresh?

For a long time, especially in my early roleplay years, I've seen many examples of people who even several posts into the roleplay couldn't tell you anything concrete about their characters. There are many players who do have their characters and can roleplay pretty solid characters without a defined idea of them at first- something I will address in a moment- but I've also seen, especially amongst the less experienced crowd, just how easily one can be tempted to use a poorly defined personality as an excuse to make their character change on a dime, to whatever is most convenient for them in the situation. This, the way I see it, is the opposite of what should happen. Personalities are meant to be inconvenient, personalities are meant to interact in unique ways and have clashes and directions of their own- not follow neatly whatever the plot hook is or whatever gives players a mechanical advantage. And when you GM and see those personalities, and see just how many people can't grasp the basic concept of a character flaw, or have personalities that are utterly meaningless because they speak only of extreme circumstances or because they are entirely defined by what others think of the character or because they are 90% made of contradictions....

Indeed, the personality section can serve some pretty important OOC purposes in my opinion. They can serve as an information bank or frame of reference for the player that made them. They can be used by the GM and players to establish organic situations that fit the characters and still achieve their narrative purpose, such as getting two characters to start off on the right foot using shared likes (which is why I like to include likes, dislikes and fears into my CS templates). They can be used by GMs to push back poorly thought out characters and at least have the player rethink them. As for how much is needed, well, I would say that depends on trust. I think a defined character is needed, but I don't think one needs to be that expansive, just to give the gist of how the character acts generally. I would argue a lot more leeway can be given on these things if the GM knows enough about the player to be sure they actually do at least have the character properly defined in their head.

I do recognize that there is one character method which falls outside of what I talked about so far, this is people who make characters best by playing them out and seeing what fits and works best for them. This is an entirely legitimate approach, even if I'm 100% certain there are a lot more people who say they prefer this method simply because they think it means they don't have to actually come up with the character at all or because it sounds easier. Even so, I think this is a case that falls back into what I was saying earlier about trust. As a GM I would still need to be able to trust that you are actually working on such a method and that you will have a defined character sooner rather than later with it. Otherwise what you're roleplaying isn't a character, it's a puppet.

Absolutely all this.

 

[VALEN T.]

im not against having a personality section but its rlly annoying having to write it up especially bc a lot of the times, the gm wants u to "list 5 positives and negatives" (imo, the listing is more tedious than writing a description)

how i've started using the personality section as is a "how do others view / what's others opinion of yc ?" section bc their family may view them as "cold and antisocial" bc they dont interact v often, their best friends as "fun when you break thru their shell", strangers as "mysterious and charming".
for me doing this is way easier bc when i create an oc i dont necessarily think of a traits list right off the bat but i can still imagine how they would behave in front of certain ppl and that helps me organise their personality a little more efficiently. its also more flexible since im writing their personality from the pov of others so theres bound to be fluctuations

 

[Crow]

the gm wants u to "list 5 positives and negatives" (imo, the listing is more tedious than writing a description)

Mein gott, this.

This is how you end up needing to fill in pointless stuff. If they need to do this, 2 or 3 is enough and 4 is pushing it.

Anyways, this thread has some of the best takes in the section so far.

 

[Jet]

Personality sections are optional when I GM because

1. Many people learn about characters as they write them. My characters are less known in the beginning and over time I learn about them more. A personality section is just words for me. Lots of annoying words I need to write so my CS is accepted. Chances are there will be discrepancies between the personality section and the actual character. Which makes the personality section pointless.

2. Meta gaming from other people. I have seen and experienced meta-gaming based on personality sections. Evil characters who act good are ruined by a personality section, unless the GM allows you to put up a fake one — making the section damaging or useless again.

3. You can't learn as much about characters and characters are less mysterious. Why remove that? Short personality sections aren't as bad with this, but when a GM demands HUGE personality sections, you turn scenes of discovery into bland interactions.

4. They are pointless. Yeah that's point #4 — they are completely pointless. Everyone agrees you shouldn't view these sections as a strict guide, so why should they exist? Some say it helps the writers, and in that case it should be an optional section. If a section has no real need, there should not be mandated work for players. The GM has no actual need to know who characters are inside. The GM does need to backgrounds though — as an example of what is needed. Which is why I defend backgrounds.

 

[Idea]

strict guide

Could you define "a strict guide" in this context?

 

[kevintheradioguy]

I really don't care that much about the character 'applications' or 'forms' myself. The only thing I'd need would be a visual reference: whether they are tall or short, whether they are brown or white, if their hair is long or cut, etc. I try my best not to read personality and bio sections - unless I'm the DM and that's important - because I feel that it is very important to get your own experience with that character instead of building expectations or seeing a direct order of how you should react to them and perceive them.

Sure, some personalities might not click, and you have to discuss what your character are before starting the game. Two passionate, aggressive people wouldn't be a good fit, for example. However, that might just be a couple of short remarks here and there during your initial chat to make sure characters would click, and don't deserve or require their own section.

That all said, there is another problem with this. Inexperienced players/writers might expect their character to have one personality, like cold, pragmatic, and unemotional cool kid, but when they start playing and the character starts interacting with other characters - real interactions, not the ones you have in your head when you always come on top - they break, and turn into overly emotional, always offended, borderline hysterical mess. On the other hand, more experienced players often have a problem describing personalities of their characters for the same reason. Sure, their character might be prone to panic and spontaneous decisions, but in their experience playing him, they also know that there's a pint of breaking after which he becomes cold and collected. He can be extremely friendly to a certain group of people - like artists and writers, but be very aggressive towards musicians. Is it all worth writing in? How to describe your character in full, but not too excessively? Noit to mention, I believe character are formed in and during the game. As people.

All and all, I do think that personality isn't an important paragraph to add to your sheet. If anything, it might be a good thing to add a few points like that to their bio, something like "She won an Oscar that yer, and it hit her in the head so much, she started thinking she's the only star, and the rest of the actors are no good charlatans"; and even then I believe that bio should only be common knowledge about a person, and not an in-depth analysis. I think I'd be okay with a few-word-personality in a sheet, covering a few points, like "melancholic, moody, passive-aggressive", just to get the feel of how they communicate, what expression they wear, what tone they have, first impression they leave behind, instead of an entire paragraph for this.

 

[Crayons]

Am I the only one who, when considering joining an RP with people I don't know, reads the CSes and especially personality section to see if these are people I want to play with?

Sometimes RPs sound good on paper but then if you realise you're playing with a bunch of one dimensional stoic samurais or distressed damsels etc, you might just not want to join.

Also I would probably judge the RP as being casual/low writing quality/one liner type if the GM doesn't ask for a CS with at least a paragraph of info on personality and one on background. Maybe that's judgemental (it is XD) but heck I have to have some filters to make sure I want to put the effort in to being active in a roleplay.

 

[Bakuyoshi]

Like I can say one problem with a personality section. A personality (and this is a huge issue I have noticed on the website) seems to be viewed as a strict this is your character fully. You do not play your character outside of this personality. When in truth we all know that a personality does not make the person. Like I'm a shy introvert IRL. I can't speak that well and have trouble putting my thoughts down. But is that true for me all of the time, no not at all. Sometimes I can be a lot more sociable and have been able to hold conversations on occasion. A personality could have something contradictory in it. Like my example of me. I know on RPN it would not fly if that example was used on a character who is listed as an introvert. In the end we all do something a little out of character from time to time. But a personality section treats it as a solid "Your character acts like this, never stray from it" in most RPs I have been in.

But that is my humble take on the matter.

 

[Idea]

Like I can say one problem with a personality section. A personality (and this is a huge issue I have noticed on the website) seems to be viewed as a strict this is your character fully. You do not play your character outside of this personality. When in truth we all know that a personality does not make the person. Like I'm a shy introvert IRL. I can't speak that well and have trouble putting my thoughts down. But is that true for me all of the time, no not at all. Sometimes I can be a lot more sociable and have been able to hold conversations on occasion. A personality could have something contradictory in it. Like my example of me. I know on RPN it would not fly if that example was used on a character who is listed as an introvert. In the end we all do something a little out of character from time to time. But a personality section treats it as a solid "Your character acts like this, never stray from it" in most RPs I have been in.

But that is my humble take on the matter.

If I may respectfully disagree, rather than everyone else being wrong on the personality, I would suggest that your view of personality is reductive to what a personality actually is. You being shy introvert IRL isn't your personality, it's small facet of your personality. Personalities are built on tendencies and learned experiences, so many we can't even process every single moment we live. Rather than contradictions, your personality is an incredibly complex thing with more variables than you or I could possibly imagine, and even a slight change of circumstances can lead the gears into an entirely different result.

To put it another way- you being sociable at times is not a contradiction or acting outside your personality. It is acting within the confines of what your personality is, just faced with different circumstances.

However, as I explained, this is a product of something incredibly complex built across every moment in your life, as well as factors like your genetic makeup, general environment and quite probably many other factors. Meanwhile, as people we can barely remember what we had for dinner three weeks ago. How can we possibly hope to replicate what life creates with our imaginations alone? To look at only the end product and not consider the process is a recipe for a failed product. If there is no reason why your character is acting differently than usual, then that's just poor writing and breaking character. But there can be entirely legitimate reasons for a character to act differently in certain circumstances.

To, again, use your example: Let's say we a extremely introverted character. However, this character is also extremely passionate about a given hobby they have, or maybe they are so introverted because they have trouble connecting to the people about them. So what happens if we put this character, who would usually break down in a group, among people who understand them and share their interests? Suddenly they can become quite sociable and hang out with a group well.

There was no contradiction here, just different factors of the same consistent personality interacting with each other and the given circumstances the character is put in.

Or even other circumstances: Let's say the character is put into a very stressful situation, and they need to quickly talk to someone because something terrible will happen otherwise. Now the character may panic, the extreme circumstances can force them to act in the ways they wouldn't normally, simply because as a person they have particular instincts. We see this all the time with very moral characters who can break down and do things their principles would never stand for otherwise because extreme circumstances forced their hand.


And this is all without even addressing one big issue: The character is part of a story. Of a narrative. I think this is a whole other discussion so I won't go into the matter into too much detail, but there definitely are things to say in how much the fundamentally impossible goal of making a character a person should stack when weighted against whether they work in a narrative sense. A simply inconsistent personality is hardly any different from a puppet moved by the writer's whim.


Final note: I doubt anyone is really arguing for absolutely unchanging characters. A personality is a fixed thing, but a personality evolves with experiences and can respond differently in different circumstances, like a sunflower following the sun. But it is the same sunflower, wherever it is facing, the direction it faces is meaningless if it is plucked out and there are no longer roots that ground it.

 

[Idea]

Am I the only one who, when considering joining an RP with people I don't know, reads the CSes and especially personality section to see if these are people I want to play with?

Sometimes RPs sound good on paper but then if you realise you're playing with a bunch of one dimensional stoic samurais or distressed damsels etc, you might just not want to join.

Also I would probably judge the RP as being casual/low writing quality/one liner type if the GM doesn't ask for a CS with at least a paragraph of info on personality and one on background. Maybe that's judgemental (it is XD) but heck I have to have some filters to make sure I want to put the effort in to being active in a roleplay.

I read the CSs before making mine, but I usually join RPs before there are any CSs out. When I GM though, I absolutely look at personalities in my reviews, and I won't accept a character (and consequentally won't accept the player) without their personality being fixed, with adequate flaws, actually describing the personality and at least a minimal sense of character direction.

 

[Cosmo]

As an RPer, as Idea said, I use it more as an information bank. If an RP has gone on for a long time, or I am involved with multiple RPs, I tend to make different characters with different personalities and going back and rereading their personality and background can serve as a reminder or let me remember what it was about that character that made them... them. It also helps me with the background because, for me, when I am writing personalities and background it helps me conceptualize it if I can link them. If X happened, how would that have shaped how this character thinks and acts? If they think and act like Y, what could have happened in the past to have encouraged that kind of behavior? Even more then that, I don't tend to write personalities as a definite thing, I tend to pick a few personality traits that are the 'keystones' to their personality and describe how that personality trait pertains to them at that moment in time because its more of a sliding scale. It means that the character can be more then what I put down there and they are not locked to that, but those 'core' traits are the 'keystone', the core, of who they are but not the sum of who they are [and even that can, and should, change based on what happens during the RP].

As a GM I always want people to write out personalities. It tells me what they are going for, what they intend for this character to be, how they can grow, where they are hurting or deficient as a character, etc. Its incredibly important to me to know, so, yea, personality section is rather essential to me. Personality tends to catch my interest and hold more weight with me then background.

 

[The One Eyed Bandit]

after many eons of deliberation i've decided that personality sections are like farts, i hate them and they stink and unless they're really bad you'll forget about it after like five seconds but there would probably be some sort of gastric disaster if they didn't crop up every now and again

 

[Malphaestus]

The character sheet is a good way to measure the skillset, and the wilingness the playerbase has towards the roleplay. If I see short sheets, it's just not my style. I've been around for long enough to know that the likelihood of that roleplay reaching my expectations and wants is adjacent to null. Additionally, it is also a good way, personality included, to do what Idea suggested, and tally what the roleplay already has, to give you inspiration and reassurance for whether you want to join or not, and with what character you want to do that.

I, for one, do not like the trend that the roleplayer-sphere has always had of not reading information regarding the roleplay. Reading character sheets, yours or others, can also help with developing plot lines. Something which is immensely less efficient and time-saving to do if the way that the characters involved think and reason is not disclosed. Read roleplay information. If you get bored from reading, what are you roleplaying for.