Mentor - The Redundant Asylum of Redundancy (and Diction!)

[AngelicAsylum]

Hello! I've decided to get more involved in the forum, so I'm offering my help as a mentor. I'm not in very many RPs right now, but I've had a good ten years experience outside of the forum, and writing is one of my main passions. If you want help making your posts "flow" better, improve your grammar and/or spelling, or just need a better way to get your point across, I'd be glad to help! I'm also willing to proofread your posts and act as a stand in thesaurus. =P

If you'd like to see some of my writing samples you can check out my blog here, and my RP Journey here. If that's just not cutting it, I can PM you some of my creative writing. Have fun!

Disclaimer!

Please only post if you REALLY want HONEST critique! I put a lot of effort and time into my critiques (as you can tell by the novels I write every time) and I'm a busy ass grad student! If you're going to get offended or ignore my responses then this might not be the best place for you!

[Lúthien]

Hi. You're awesome.

I want to mention that your writing is always fantastic and flows beautifully. Do you also review character sheets to make sure they're realistic and not mary sue-ish? I know some people need help in that field as well.

Anywho. I think you'll become a great mentor! So I'm going to advertise your thread

[AngelicAsylum]

Hi bb, thank you my dear you are a good friend. <3 *awkward handshake*

Yes, I'd definitely look over character sheets since I do that anyway from the bushes. I'd do pretty much anything! In er, a mentoring sense not in a... well you know. >_O

[Lúthien]

Well here's an honest question:

How can I create characters that are not so cut and paste? I always try to make them different in a way, but for some reason they always come out so typical

[AngelicAsylum]

I like your characters but your wish is my command:

When I create characters I kinda go through a mental checklist: Appearance, basic personality, history, physical abilities.

We all have shit we lean towards. I tend to go for magic users and/or people with a lot of intelligence because I relate to characters who are more academic. It's natural for people to do what they're comfortable with. But when I get fed up and think "Okay Ang, lets go for something different" I take at least two of those categories and do something completely the opposite of what it was before.

For the sake of not making this TOO tl;dr lets just go with personality. So my last character, James, is calm to a fault, apathetic and has a dry wit with a streak for violence. Most of my characters actually have been this way so far, even Rorschach who I didn't even CREATE, so lets change it up a bit.

So we have calm and apathetic. Fine. Lets make this new person excitable and strung out. Someone with anxiety. This will effect not only the way s/he fights but also the way s/he interacts with others. The character would possibly be shy but instead of just blushing and not speaking, s/he would maybe ramble on too much, have irritating anxious habits like nail-biting, and say stupid things at the wrong time. They'd also get upset easily if something makes them angry, leading them to not think clearly in battle which could lead to errors. They probably wouldn't LIKE fighting anyway, thanks to their nervousness and insecurity.

Do you see how I basically made a completely different character just from that?

If you don't want to go for opposites, you can always lay out your "comfort zone" character and then your "opposite character" and take traits from both:

James: calm to a fault, apathetic and has a dry wit with a streak for violence.

Opposite character: Anxious, excitable, stumbles over words, dislikes fighting

New character: Anxious, will frequently fight (can't control anger perhaps, anxiety and nervousness would effect this probably in the negative), can't communicate well with others (uses sense of humor badly and ends up offending people).

So that's generally how I try to make my characters different. It's a common problem, and most people tend to have a certain trend. I sure as shit do. >_O You can also do this for any other parts of a character's makeup. Anyway, I hope that helps and sorry for the tl;dr.

[Lúthien]

rep'd as a thanks!

I always try to make my characters opposite as possible, but it always comes down to them sharing some personality trait. Anywho, this is definitely a great help and I shall take your advice

[AngelicAsylum]

Thanks! Good luck, and to reiterate I like your characters. If they were too sueish or something you know I'd tell you. =P

[Ace of Hearts™]

See, I've always been able to come up with interesting settings, but I could never come up with a gripping plot, all that happened was I'd cringe.

How can I get a rager from both setting and plot?

[AngelicAsylum]

That's a little more difficult. The problem with plot is that it's basically all been done before. I think even classic plots (like Imp's pirate RP) can be done well IF there's a lot of planning done for it. Plots need to have ideas - that's mainly why I haven't GMed yet.

It's one thing if you get all your characters in a specific place and they all interact, but that dies down rather quickly and can go stale. If you want a gripping plot for an RP I think it's not so much WHAT you do but how much stuff you have lined up for it. A good example of this would be Athamar (which Necella still needs to post in >_O ) because even after we fight Mordra, she still has at least two or three other missions for us lined up so far, with little mini events going on in each. Plot is also my main problem with GMing - I can never think of good ideas to keep it going. But I think that's the key to making an RP so good.

So when you're planning out an RP, I say make an outline of 5 - 10 events that could happen long term AND short term before posting it on RPA. Even if you don't get to all of them you would still have all this stuff on backup just in case it gets boring.

As for helping you GET ideas, I'm not sure if I could really do that. Though, I would say visit some Tropes pages for inspiration. Even if you don't get any ideas, it's still a fun read. Hope that helps!

[Ace of Hearts™]

Yes, it did! Very informative! I do get my events down, I just always nervous thinking I need to combine them into some complicated web. Like Inception!