The Role-Player's Guide to "Why Should We Care?"

GojiBean

Your resident irradiated Kaiju King
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"Why should we care?"

"Why should we care?" is a question we should all be forcing ourselves to ask as we engage with the characters owned and portrayed on the page by other people. And the reason is simple: Investment.

If we don't personally find a reason to invest in the story of another character, then our interest not only in that character will drop sharply. However, as a consequence, so too will our investment in the RP itself. And before you know it we're leaving the RP for something more interesting.

One thing I believe a lot of role-players don't realize about themselves is that they're not here just searching for good stories to be a part of. They're searching for a purpose. A sense of meaning, and importance. We innately seek to find a reason to be important to someone else on the page. That's why we find ourselves asking "hey, wanna get something going with our characters?" (aka get an interaction going). We want to feel like we're important to those other characters. And if we don't find ourselves caring about those characters before interaction opportunities arise then we're a lot less likely to invest and try to initiate those interactions.

For example: Let's say we've joined a fantasy adventure RP with elves, dragons, magic, the works. One of the characters is a human/dragon hybrid who was previously living in the draconic lands. But now, having defied the will of their king by refusing to become an emissary of war against a nearby human settlement that's been encroaching on dragon territory despite several warnings not to, the character has been exiled from the dragon lands and was ridiculed, belittled, and scorned to the bone by everyone, including those they previously felt were their closest friends and family. Now outcast with nothing they seek refuge and comfort in the land of humans which is a side of their bloodline they've never fully appreciated or thought highly of before.

This is an awesome idea for a character (if I do say so myself), but one important question remains... Why should we care?

It's a simple question, but it's hard to answer because there's any number of reasons we can come up with for why we both should and should not care about this character and whatever becomes of him/her throughout the RP.

Or... Are there?

Let's take a few minutes together to shake things up a bit, and shift gears from why should we care about other characters to how we can make others care about ours first.

The reason why will become clear later on, and I promise I'll come back to it just in case you miss it between now and then.

Instead of asking it of the external (aka, other people), let's focus on the internal (ourselves).

How can we make others care? What do we need to do? What do we need to say? What do we need to think about and convey on the page to make others care about this character and empathize/sympathize with their struggles and hate the same inner demons the character does so they're rooting for the character to overcome them later?

Well, that's actually pretty easy...


Show people why they should care.


How do we show people why they should care?

One of your first instincts might be to write about the past and do flashbacks or brief moments of reflection where the narrative text surrounding your character's current mindset describe their history. And often times we end up using the same old reasons. For example: "My character's best friend/lover died suddenly to (insert reason) and now they don't want to feel that kind of pain ever again, so they don't talk to anyone."

Don't. Do. This.

Reflection and flashbacks are very common tools for revealing past events that are integral to the character's current situation, and I'm not against them. In fact I use them myself quite a bit.

However, I have found they are often overused, or simply used inappropriately. Going back to my previous example about the friend/lover dying to whatever, I've seen it happen at least once in almost every RP I've ever been in that I didn't personally serve as the GM for. When I asked what the flashback was for about the friend/lover's death, the player responded that it was to show a major source of the character's current reluctance to engage in conversation. When I asked how this experience was relevant to one's ability to simply hold a conversation they couldn't give me a good answer. Their response boiled down to "well, the best friend died so they're not keen on experiencing that kind of loss again."

... Yeah, losing someone doesn't exactly translate to "I don't wanna talk to anyone" ever again. Having a reluctance to let themselves fall in love again? Maybe. But just talking? Not a chance.

Why should we care about that kind of character where the ends don't justify the means?

We have no valid reason to.

Look, losing one's best friend is a horrific loss. I myself have experienced this in real life, so I know. But it's incredibly rare that such a loss would trigger "emotional lockout" from the rest of the world where even just holding conversations becomes all but impossible. Why? Because the loss isn't related to you being able to talk to people. Can it happen that a big loss results in emotional shutdown? Yes. Does it happen often? Briefly while in the grieving period, but afterwards it disappears far more often than not. So ask yourself, "do I need to use this tired old trope to get the same result as outlined above by the player?"

No. You don't. Because using loss to shut out your character from the rest of the world is always going to get the same reaction: Huh, so one person died and now they don't talk to anyone? Yeah, okay. So its that kind of character. Great. I'll focus on the other characters to interact with then.

And what happens to you and your character?

You get left out of basically everything, to the point where nobody even really mentions your character's presence anymore unless they feel they have to because you tried to use one of your posts to force your way into the conversation or whatever event is taking place so that they'd be seen and heard (presuming they said something, of course).

If you want to convince others to care about a character who doesn't want to speak, you have one area to focus on: Speech.

Any flashbacks shouldn't focus on something like a battle or the loss of a loved one. Those are irrelevant no matter how badly you want to force the issue. Instead, it should focus on the fact that any time your character tried to speak up for themselves they were shut down in traumatic ways. For example, when your character was still a child and tried talking back to an abusive father the man punched your character so hard their jaw broke so they physically couldn't speak, and he then said "maybe that'll shut you up for a while!" A few years later they try standing up to a bully and literally every word your character says in their own defense is ruthlessly mocked and repeated back in a sarcastic fashion until the character gives up speaking for themselves entirely and begins to cry. And this emotional shutdown just makes the bullies happier and more eager to continue the emotional torment which lasts until you fade that particular memory to black. A few years later in their young adult lives they decide to ask their crush out but are rejected. A few months later they have a new crush and ask her out, but she mentions seeing them being rejected by their last crush and thinks that them asking now is just trying to plug the gap in their heart and isn't real love for them specifically, so they're rejected again.

That's how you can convince people why they should care about this character who doesn't want to engage in conversation, despite how tired the trope is. It turns the character's background into a goal for the other role-players to overcome regarding your character. Every time your character speaks the other role-players feel a sense of accomplishment, and their personal investment in your character takes a jump. Why? Because they feel like they and their own character(s) just took a step in helping your character deal with that traumatic past which makes them feel like they're actively participating in your character's private journey.

Why is this important?

Because it makes the other role-players feel like they, and their characters, are able to become important to your character.

If another role-player doesn't believe they or their character can become important to your character after the first few interactions they have in the RP, they're going to stop caring about your character very, very quickly and will focus on the characters that do make them believe they are important.

So, make them care by presenting them with a believable and personally relatable goal to achieve regarding your character, and allow their early interactions with said character to produce some results. Small results, obviously. But results all the same. For example, their character tries to talk to yours about about 3-4 different topics, and they're about to give up until your character gives a one or two word reply to the last topic they mentioned. Why did your character respond? The topic was something they're interested in and/or feel is important in their own lives, so even if they themselves don't consciously know why they replied and opened their mouths, they did it. And that gives the other character (and their player) that sense of importance in your character's life which makes them care more about the character and want to interact with them more.

Of course, this is just one reason using a tired old trope (that I hate with a fiery burning passion, but still see at least some value in if it's used right). This same strategy works with any character in any genre.

Let's say your character is a shy, reclusive young lady who was always bullied and told she was ugly (even though in reality she's quite cute) and so she doesn't put any pride in her appearance and has unwittingly turned herself into the ugly duckling she thinks the world sees her as. However, she is brought out of this stupor by a new girl who transferred into the school (and her class) who just won't leave her alone and is constantly telling her how cute she is and pushing her to take more care and pride in her appearance. Finally she gives in, and when she begins taking care of her appearance she's able to reveal to the world how beautiful she really is, both inside and out as she gets more attention from both boys and girls who flock to her beauty and kind personality.

Show off the "ugly" trauma. Show her parents always saying she "looks more like a boy" when she was a little kid, even when she was present to hear it. Show how her "friends" at school always talked about her behind her back about how her hair always looked like blades of grass more than hair because of how thick and clumped together the strands always were. Show how even the school counselors said her appearance was probably the cause, but never went further to discuss how she could make any positive changes because they just didn't care. Show how every time she tried to doll herself up she was made fun of relentlessly by the other "popular" and "pretty" girls at the school until she cried out all the makeup in front of everyone which just encouraged the mob mentality to flare up around her until literally everyone in the school yard was making fun of her until the end of lunch when they had to go back to class at the bell.

Literally anything can and does work so long as you focus on a believable and relatable source for the trauma being presented.

If your character doesn't want to talk, focus on speaking being a trauma in and of itself.

If your character is afraid of certain animals, show them being attacked or frightened by said animals over and over and over again when they were young.

If your character is great at making friends but never wants anything beyond friendship because of how literally every crush has rejected them, show every rejection one by one in different flashbacks, and give each rejection its own life and circumstance that all proved to be in some way humiliating, soul crushing, or just plain painful.

If your character doesn't want to show off their own talents or skills, show how their talents and skills were ridiculed or frowned upon by their peers, teachers, and even family/friends to the point where all they had were said talents and skills in the safety and security of their bedroom.

But again, focus on the believable and relatable source of the trauma. If your character doesn't want to speak to anyone, a single death of someone important is not going to make anyone believe or care for your character's suffering or their current circumstances.


Back to "Why should we care?"

I told you I'd come back to this, and here is my promise kept.

So, did you pick up on why I said it was important to shift gears from "why should we care" to "show people why they should care?"

If not, here's the reason: If we don't find a way to make others care about our characters, we've given them no incentive to do anything to make us care about their characters either.

This creates a mutually non-beneficial relationship between us as role-players, and this also negatively affects our characters. If you don't care about my character, you won't do anything on the page to make me care about yours. And if we don't care about each other's characters we won't care to have them interact which basically defeats the purpose of them sharing space on the page.

So...

"Why should we care?"

This question really goes beyond just you and me, as well. In fact "we" refers to everyone. You. Me. And anyone else we role-play with over the course of our role-playing lives.

Why should we care?

What have I offered you and others with my characters to make you care? That's something only I can answer.

What have you offered me and others with your characters to make us care? That's something only you can answer.

What have others offered you and I with their characters to make us care? That's something only they can answer.

When we care about our own characters enough to make others care about them as well, that's how mutual investment in each other, and in our respective characters, is born and shared. And it gives a lot more life to what we do and how much enjoyment we get from it. Not to mention it helps fuel our desire to stick to the role-plays for longer so they don't die within 20 posts. Because when we care about our characters enough to show others why they should too, they in turn show us reasons to care about their characters. And all parties involved will be more likely to want to engage meaningfully on the page which will only continue to maintain an active sense of life and purpose along our shared journey.

I'll leave with this...

Our mutual investment in each other's characters, when approached correctly, can help us all accomplish some truly amazing and wonderful things together.

Thank you so much for reading!

~ GojiBean
 
What a nice tutorial, and I can say from experience I have refrained from interacting with characters that didn't act like real people, and have even been guilty of doing the same thing when I was still fairly new to RPing. We feel empathy for believable characters.

Another problem that can cause people to stop caring is when a character has no weaknesses. If a character never blunders, no character can help them. If everything is easy for them, then their rivals can't show their ability to grow. There is no value in them helping others, as they depreciate every challenge they come across. It is impossible to care about anything a Mary Sue does.
 

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