Character Prompting Sheet

[Storn]

{pardon if this double post}
This thread prompted this in conjunction to something our group was exploring:
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=18369.0

Linked below is a pdf to my RPGnet thread on art.  The pdf is a "cover sheet" to help prompt questions much like Burning Wheel's BITs does.  Since we are grafting onto Champions, BITs is not a direct correlation that is comfortable for a couple of the players intact.  The first link *should* take you to the PDF hopefully.  The 2nd link is to the page that the pdf is on in the RPGnet thread.  I need to link to RPGnet since I could attach directly here.  Much of the below text is pasted from there.

The reboot concerns RDU Neil's Champions campaign. Lately, there has been a lot of dimensional adventures. Cribbing off of Marvel's Exiles and Stargate (Atlantis) and a bit of discussion of round-robin GMing... we are going to do an alternate RDU to jump our PCs from. Then they will travel to different dimensions encounter different stories. Making it easy to for co-GMs to step in and not step on toes of the others.

So tonight, we are sitting down and creating characters together, sorta tweaked analogues of our usual campaign. Wanna play a heroic, good version of Doctor Destroyer? Why not. Wanna play a tweaked version of another Player Character? Lets talk about it and see where the boundries might exist.

Our group is very different personalities. We have trouble sometimes communicating what we want for our PCs... what kind of scenes... what kind of subplots. I personally provide a lot of "hooks" for my GMs. But Neil sometimes interperts those hooks (re: Hero Disadvantages) in very different ways. We've talked about how to facilitate communication. This is just one arrow in the quiver, but since I'm a visual dude, Neil came up with this.

What Neil is going to say tonight is "Do NOT put anything down on the sheet that the PLAYER does NOT want to explore." In other words, while it may be cool that Bounty the Cosmic Head Hunter has a vicious hunted herself... if the player is NOT interested in being pursued relentlessly... don't put it down.

Due to other threads I've seen of "my players are not responding" of late, I thought this might be a way to help. It might even help an already running game, if folks are quite gelling their PCs to the situation (or vice versa).

Critique and comments are awesome!

http://forum.rpg.net/attachment.php?attachmentid=13535&d=1137603207
http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?p=5164871#post5164871

[dunlaing]

I like the idea of this sheet. I have a few suggestions, but they might just be a different way of doing it, not a better way:

• I'd like the "Why is this character cool to play" box to be twice the size of the other boxes.
• I think "What is your character's biggest secret" would be an interesting thing to have on there, as it would bring out that element of the character while at the same time making a character secret into public player knowledge, which I think is a very good thing.
• Since it's you doing this, I'd like to see an outline of a character somewhere on the sheet for people to draw their costumes on.
  

[Warren]

I second the idea that you should make the "Why is the character cool to play?" box bigger. Or maybe rephrase it to, "What is the coolest thing about this character?" and put it at the top of the page, with a bigger box.

Similarly, I'm not so fond of the "What is the character BEST at" and "What is the character good at questions" so much. They seem to be a bit generic and could result in bland answers, IMO. Maybe change them to "What is the most interesting* ability this character has?" Also, you seem to have two similar boxes - "What niche does your character fill on the team?" and "What is your character's place in the group?" which I think could be combined into "How and why does your character work with the rest of the team?" Finally, I think the "biggest secret" thing is worth adding and you could throw in a "greatest weakness" question too.

Please don't take my comments as ripping your idea to shreds. I think it's pretty cool, and could be a worthwhile addition to many games.

Warren

*"most interesting"="coolest", but I didn't want to repeat myself.

[Storn]

I like the idea of this sheet. I have a few suggestions, but they might just be a different way of doing it, not a better way:

• I'd like the "Why is this character cool to play" box to be twice the size of the other boxes.
• I think "What is your character's biggest secret" would be an interesting thing to have on there, as it would bring out that element of the character while at the same time making a character secret into public player knowledge, which I think is a very good thing.
• Since it's you doing this, I'd like to see an outline of a character somewhere on the sheet for people to draw their costumes on.
  

There is art on the original that Neil sent out.  I had to strip it out because the file size was over what RPGnet would allow for an attachement.

As for outline... well, most PCs tend to get a picture down the road eventually anyway.  No one wants to draw their characters anymore... prefering to let me do it.  This is not me boasting... I would LOVE it if they draw their own characters. 

second the idea that you should make the "Why is the character cool to play?" box bigger. Or maybe rephrase it to, "What is the coolest thing about this character?" and put it at the top of the page, with a bigger box.

Well, Neil will be sure to add to this... but my take?  We want to prompt the player to think about the player.  Coolest thing about the character is that: "he has claws and can regenerate really fast and he is angry and great at killing things."  Why Wolverine is cool to play for Storn is "yeah, he is a badass, but his story arc is about finding his humanity... about melding & coming to terms of animal and civilization together..." that is what makes Wolverine cool to me.  I think "Why is the character cool to play" is the better prompt.

"What niche does your character fill on the team?" and "What is your character's place in the group?"

Niche is about the campaign... where is the PCs place in the overall world.  That is very different than where is your place in the group dynamic of the team.  I think it might overlap with "the Best" question more than place in the team.  But that is just me musing.

Greatest weakness is probably a good one to have.

[Storn]

Oh.  Forgot to say a couple of things.

Neil and I are totally in agreement that some entries may be left as "I dunno."  Neil very much likes to craft his characters in play.  I very much come to the table with a strong concept in place.  Neither are wrong. 

and...

We are going to use it tonight.  I'll have an actual "gameplay" (or game chargen) report tomorrow for ya!

We will see how the coversheet works in action.

[RDU Neil]

Here is a link to the Herogames website... where I could post the Character Cover Sheet in full.

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showpost.php?p=945003&postcount=1

It is not intended to be THE character sheet... which will have the game stats/powers/skills and picture.  Again... Cover sheet... not the actual sheet.

I'm totally open for modifying things... but I kept the boxes relatively small to discourage long winded description... and encourage concise detail.  The "Best at..." is somewhat important for our style of play (IMO of course) because we are playing in an action/adventure genre... where the character's ability to "do something" is important.  In fact... if player's find that they aren't that interested in what their character can "do" might indicate a disfunction between their desires and the game. 

Now... if the thing they are best at doing... they are happy if it only comes up rarely... that they are more interested in exploring their relationships and weaknesses... cool.  But in most cases, they do want to have that "unique" element to them.  It could be flat and boring... but it could be quite specific to why they are playing the character.   We'll see.  (I agree with Storn that "Best at..." and "Niche..." may well overlap.  I also think asking the question twice, but in two different ways, could help folks really think about what they want out of the character.

As Storn said... we'll see tonight.

[Sydney Freedberg]

Very neat.

My personal take would be to rephrase things explicitly along the lines of "what do you want?," e.g.
- "what are you most excited about doing with this character?"
- "what cool things do you want to see your character get to do in play?"
- "what horrible, awful things do you think it would be cool to have happen to your character?"

[Kintara]

Very neat.

My personal take would be to rephrase things explicitly along the lines of "what do you want?," e.g.
- "what are you most excited about doing with this character?"
- "what cool things do you want to see your character get to do in play?"
- "what horrible, awful things do you think it would be cool to have happen to your character?"

Yes.  Even ask questions if only to make sure that they understand that player desires don't match character desires like, "What terrible flaws does your character possess that you want the story to hit hard?"

[RDU Neil]

Very neat.

My personal take would be to rephrase things explicitly along the lines of "what do you want?," e.g.
- "what are you most excited about doing with this character?"
- "what cool things do you want to see your character get to do in play?"
- "what horrible, awful things do you think it would be cool to have happen to your character?"

I thought about such phrasing... but to be honest, this is an attempt to nudge folks in that direction and there might be some resistance (or disconnect) in thinking about character's that way.  This can get them moving in that "player is what is important, character doesn't really exist" mindset... but jumping in the deep end would likely have a chilling effect, I'm afraid.

Baby steps.

[Kintara]

Well, like you guys say, they don't have to answer it.  As long as you make that explicit, I think they'll feel safe.

[dunlaing]

I'm totally open for modifying things... but I kept the boxes relatively small to discourage long winded description... and encourage concise detail. 

I get that. I didn't mean it should be bigger so they can write more, I meant it should be bigger so that it's the most important thing on the sheet. I also agree with Storn that "Why is the character cool to play" is loads better than "What's cool about the character."

[Warren]

OK, go with "why is the character cool to play" then :) I do still think that this question - in whatever form - is the 'core' of the player's view of the character, and should be promoted to the top of the sheet and made otherwise more important. Plus, I agree with Sydney that asking the questions along "what do you want?" makes things more explicit, and therefore, IMO, better.

[RDU Neil]

OK, go with "why is the character cool to play" then :) I do still think that this question - in whatever form - is the 'core' of the player's view of the character, and should be promoted to the top of the sheet and made otherwise more important. Plus, I agree with Sydney that asking the questions along "what do you want?" makes things more explicit, and therefore, IMO, better.

Funny... I had the question at the beginning... but it was suggested originally to put it at the end.  Really... the idea is that all the preceding questions should help the player answer the "Why is the character cool to play?" question... by forcing them to think about things they wouldn't normally consider. 

[Storn]

Yup, it in its first form, Neil had put that question at the top.  At my suggestion, he put it at the bottom.  I just had this funny feeling that some players at OUR table would freeze if you hit them with that first.  They need to work up to it.

And for me too... The character that I'm mulling over, I'm not sure why the character would be cool to play, in the beginning.  Neil and I were on the phone, he tossed a concept out there and I countered with an idea I had been thinking of.  But in the early going, I didn't know what made the character cool to me in a nutshell.  After the conversation, I would be in a much better place  to state that. 

I think once I do the sheet tonight, I might be able to summerize it.  Or least be close enough to start the game off with some kick and bang and boom and direction!

[Storn]

Okay, I have an after action report.  I'm sure Neil will chime in with even better observations than me.

We did a group chargen session last night and turn into quite a bit of fun for at least me... I'm pretty sure everyone had fun, but I don't want to speak for them.

The players
Neil:  anyone who reads this thread will know of.  The head GM.  Illusionist Nar as a GM (I think).
Storn:  that's me.  I'm pretty nar..but I can do gamist stuff too.  I'm pretty opinionated and will drive story.
Joe:  A definitely gamist leaning player, very enthusiastic and comes to play.
James:  A nar leaning player, who can be very quiet and hard to draw out.
Brigit:  Joe's wife who constantly surprises me with her love of pounding things combined with extraordinairy (and often funny) sudden roleplaying vignettes. 

The Premise:
Reboot of Neil's RDU Champions (people with powers) game.  Or perhaps a new start instead of reboot is more appropriate.  The idea is to start the game in an "alternate" dimension of RDU.  Where some of the dimensional subplots can be the main focus of this group's story.  We all know that very quickly, our group is going to be jaunting through dimensions.  Our group is to have known of each other and been a group for "awhile".  Neil has to come up with a character too, because round-robin GMing is going to be attempted.

The Evening.
I get there after Joe and Brigit, but before James.  Almost immediately, we start talking about our concepts.  Brigit fills out the Chargen Cover Sheet IMMEDIATELY, cracking me up.  She grades some papers first, and I blink, and she has written the whole thing out.  Here I feared I was the one coming to the table with too much already pre-prepped in my head.  Bam.  She is pretty much ready to go. 

She sets the tone for what the Chargen Cover Sheet's primary usefulness is; "What is your role in the group"... her quick answer is "big sister".  Cool.  Joe, Neil and I all nod.

Joe has two concepts, both are well-rounded jack of all trades.  One is a gadgeteer.    The other is a the 4 elements super martial artist.  Both concepts are probably gearing up for beign the tactical leader of the outfit.  Something I strongly encourage because I've done it and don't want to repeat that experience.  Both ideas intrigue Neil.  I lean towards gadgeteer.

My concept is a young naive alternate daughter of a character I already run.  She comes from a legacy of superheroes...and I could draw powers from Dad, Mom, and Grandpa, skipping Grandma because Grandma was Desolidification power set and the combo with the other genetic powers would be heinous and I've already played desolid characters recently.  Visual dude that I am, I based it on a character that I had drawn to demonstrate "flight powers" for Hero Games... and then drew several more times in subsequent publications... so this was a character who I had been vaguely, but gradually building in my head for some time.

Neil is really vague about what he is thinking concept wise.  But he mentions being the "second", non-com kinda role.

James arrives.  We all quickly bring him up to speed on what we are thinking, trotting out our concepts.  I hold back, wanting to give him space because I'm pretty outgoing and he needs that space to think and then come forth with that. 

We start using the sheets in earnest while table talk continues.  James is interested in a flying brick who has to put up with Secret ID kinda problems, or a hot-headed flame guy named appropriately "hot shot".  As we fill out the sheets, the whole table goes, "well, Secret ID is almost useless if we are jumping from dimension to dimension."  Or is it?  The suggestion is thrown out that perhaps variations of those important relations of his superman clone often seem to come up.  This is intriguing, we all like it... we gently steer James towards his superman clone and away from Hotshot. 

But this has blown my concept out of the water.  I was thinking of my character being a flying brick, naive, exploratory and between James and Brigit, my concept is too similar to an amalgamation of both for me.  But I'm cool with that and want James to have this character because often he takes subtle, overly complicated in mechanics terms, characters... and they are not all that "super".  This is a guy who can stand up to a whole lot of punishment.  I'll come up with something else... what?  I don't know.

{not sure how much I can get in one post, going to continue on in a new post}