[Jupiter_Storm]

I'm really grateful for the replies so far, and I'm happy to see people talking passionately about what interests them. It's helping me, for one, to better understand other points of view and other approaches to writing characters.

For example Deja's post highlights the point that sometimes it's not about people simply 'not enjoying' a particular style of RP. Sometimes it's the case that when you're fully immersed in the game a lot of the emotional trauma can affect you as well (I've seen this in LARP, actually, with people crying over the loss of a friend after a long campaign). There is a place for darkness and suffering, but it can be toned down by necessity if we wanted to be more inclusive.

Turadis perfectly sums up how I feel about my own characters - if I put too much of a backstory on them, it starts to feel 'rickety' and mechanical and I cannot get into them, no matter what I do. (Gwaine and Brent were reworked how many times???) Organic development is really meaningful and it's this reliance upon other characters to enhance our own experience that means we should try to come together more, in roleplay.

And I think that the point about investing in other people being a great start is spot on. This is easier to do in guilds, for sure. Something I've avoided a lot and wish I hadn't.

I also agree with Kunai in that it can often feel like there's cliques (and sometimes, that might be true) due to popularity and fame that revolve around the "worthy chosen few" but at the same time, as crazy as this sounds, we need people like that who are prominent individuals to serve as living reminders that long-term organic development does pay off. And they're not as unreachable as it may often seem, even though we (me included) can allow ourselves to get bitter about it. People are always happy to make new friends, ultimately.


Kuan's point about your actions having an effect on the world or story in some way is a really big one. That's a bit of a goal for me, to affect some sort of change on my characters or for others to affect change so that I have something to gossip about with my companions. Part of the whole 'dynamic world' feel.

I'm excited to see what else others come up with!