Collaborative Character Creation

[Andrew Cooper]

In most of the games my players are used to playing, character creation is strictly a solitary process.  In D&D, for example, the creation process is where everyone sits down individually and comes up with their character.  The most collaboration that goes on is for players to periodically ask the DM for information about the setting or perhaps to get permission to include a Feat/Skill from a secondary sourcebook.  For most D&D games this is sufficient.

However, I am designing a game and wanting to play some other games where character creation is a group effort.  Where *your* character is still a group-owned item up until (and maybe after) play starts.  The problem I've run into is that my group just doesn't seem to get this.  They give mental assent to the idea but then in practice they go right back to making characters all on their own without input from anyone else.

Has anyone else run into this problem before?  How did you deal with it?  What are some good techniques that can be used to get the players more involved as a group in the character creation process?

I'm sure there are some threads out there about this but my search-fu is weak for some reason on this site.  Any threads about this subject would be appreciated too, as I'd like to read as much as I can about the issue to better understand what I am dealing with and how to maneuver my players past it.

[Andrew Morris]

Well, Tony's Misery Bubblegum has players assigning each other traits during play. That's the first one to come to mind, since there are several current threads on the game.

[timfire]

However, I am designing a game and wanting to play some other games where character creation is a group effort.  Where *your* character is still a group-owned item up until (and maybe after) play starts.

In Prime Time Adventures, characters are created collectively, and then after the characters are made, players choose which ones they want to play.

In the [PTA game] I played with Ron and his crew, I believe the main character "Kimmy" / "Malevola" was create pretty much totally collaboratively, with no idea of who would play her.  Tod suggested the producer "Hugh", which he then went on to play. Hugh was still created pretty collaboratively, I felt, even if Todd intended to play him along (which I'm not sure if he did or not). The other two characters, I felt, were pretty much the individual efforts of myself and Julie, respectively.

I bet this type of experience is pretty common in PTA games, though I haven't played enough to be sure.

[John Harper]

My game Danger Patrol has group character creation, and characters are not permanently "owned" by single players during play.

The technique I am using is a kind of "pass the buck" system where each player creates a few aspects for each character. Everyone starts by picking two words to describe a character (these are like archetypes -- Robot Detective, Psychic Commando, etc.). Then the character sheets are passed clockwise. Now everyone writes down one Trait for each of the archetype words. Then the sheets are passed again and more details are added. And around they go until all of the characters are complete.

Table talk, suggestions, and collaboration are strongly encouraged during creation, but for each phase, the person holding the sheet is the "buck stopper" for that character, at that moment.

I'm hoping that by breaking ownership of a given character immediately during creation, it will be easier for players to do all the character swapping asked of them during play.

[Paul Czege]

Hey Tim,

In Prime Time Adventures, characters are created collectively, and then after the characters are made, players choose which ones they want to play.

Is this true? I don't remember it in the game text at all. And it wasn't how we did it when we played.

It is true, however, of Alyria.

Paul

[Vaxalon]

Character ownership is a hard habit to break, but a valuable one.  I believe that it was Ars Magica that first introduced it, where the lower-ranked members of the Covenant could be played by anyone.

I would suggest starting at that level.

Have a session for minor character creation.  Do the sheet-passing trick.  Then put the characters in a binder, and say that you are not going to play these characters... they can only be brought in by players.

Then create an incentive for the PC's to divide up their efforts, perhaps by appealing to individual goals rather than group goals.    This will encourage those minor characters to see play.

[timfire]

In Prime Time Adventures, characters are created collectively, and then after the characters are made, players choose which ones they want to play.

Is this true? I don't remember it in the game text at all. And it wasn't how we did it when we played.

It is true, however, of Alyria.

Well, I admit I don't own the game, so I can't tell you for sure. But that was the way I remember it being explained. That was also the way they did it in the infamous "Moose in the City" game. Maybe its just a Ron Edwards thing.

[Andrew Norris]

We did group character creation for my Sorcerer game; I think it was successful, although we did still have each character mostly created by their player, with some input during the process.

We talked through character generation in stages, going around the room, asking each player how they'd like to handle a certain element. If nothing else, I think that it served as a springboard for giving others ideas, even though most of the discussion from a given player was about their character. I also think we were able to help shape the rules representation to the player's mental image, although we could have done that with four solo sessions.

Two of my players provided ideas for every character, though; both had discussed the game with me beforehand a bit more. I think that our next campaign will have a lot more back-and-forth during group character creation; all the communication between players during our previous games has lended to much more "table talk" and suggestions for actions.

[Andrew Morris]

Capes and Universalis are good games for breaking out of character-ownership mindset, in my experience. You might want to examine those games to see how they do it. Though honestly, I don't know if the texts themselves are that good at getting the point across, or if that's just something that happens in play.

I think Capes conveys it better, however. In Universalis, sure, someone can take control of a character you created -- it says so right in the rules. And yeah, they might do something with it, or add traits to it that you don't like, but you can always contest that. Besides, they might just take control of the character to say some dialogue, and it's no skin off your nose. In Capes, your character-ownership sensibilities are smacked upside the head. When someone takes a character you created or were playing, they're most definitely going to do something with it -- and the odds are it's going to be something that competes with you, the player.

To give your group the wake-up call, you might want to play a normal game, but then as soon as they've created characters, take them away, then make them roll dice to determine the order in which they can choose from all the characters (except the one they created, of course). After they've finished grumbling and selecting characters, offer to let them start over again, knowing how characters will be distributed. You'll probably see a lot of collaboration the second time around. Sometimes a boot to the head is what's needed. I don't know your group, though.

[Andrew Cooper]

Gak... I'm certain to get my Andrew's mixed up here.  Especially since there's only 1 letter difference in both your names.

Thanks to everyone for the replies.  All of these are excellent ideas and I've really mulled them over while thinking about character creation in my game.  I'm considering a method where during the creation process, each player takes turns adding either a new character or something significant to an existing character.  Participating earns them "points" that they can use once play starts to do "stuff".  Obviously "points" and "stuff" is rather undefined at this time but that's what I'm working on.

Andrew Morris, your Boot to the Head method is rather intriguing.  I might have to try that.

[M. J. Young]

Let me echo Paul's mention of Legends of Alyria. The characters can only be created cooperatively, because part of the creation of the characters is their relationships to each other--they only make sense in the context of those relationships, the storymap.

There's a thread somewhere in the Alyria forum in which I describe our group's character creation process.

--M. J. Young