Character Hotel

I'm drawing straws as to how to keep my characters involved in the story effectively, so I think I'll take a break and introduce some new ones later.

I'm also waiting for some time to go by before my story element can make sense, so I'm going to go ahead and time skip.

Orange bars of sunset faded from the dining room window. The lunch had dragged on, the dinner had come early, and the winter days were short. Jeremy excused himself and retired to his room, where he fell asleeep within minutes.

(OOC: Let's take a pause from the action, I've something to say:

I am more than willing to continue sharing and developing my characters with each other. It is quite the interesting exercise — we help shape and define who our characters are facing new and strange contexts, and more importantly, exploring ourselves as writers.

I can distinctly remember some classic, winning moments in the entire Character Boogaloo series. These, sadly, span less and less as the inanity wears more and more. This, I wish to bring to light for everyone, so we can overcome it and show that we've got a good story to tell. I know we have masterpieces waiting within ourselves. We only need a beacon to show the way.

Like any great series can suffer, we have sequelitis. From ShockingSwerves, to Ass Pulling to the over-abundance of OOC-chatter and generally, wrecking the verisimilitude, a promising premise is turned into something so uninspired and dull that we only continue for the sake of hoping one of us would make things interesting again.

It's natural to try and recapture the magic and tone which made the first and second Character threads so wonderful. We'd think to themselves: "Hmm. X worked really well then. If we ramp X up and make ten times as much of it, we'd love it!" Unfortunately, "X" usually comes as trite fighting, or something else equally arbitrary. Although it may seem like a good idea at the time — this rarely ends well; trying to please ourselves like this usually ends up both

• (a) Annoying ourselves and our readers.  ^*
  ^{We realize that what we think we want isn't necessarily what we actually want.}
  and
• (b) Isolating potentially new people from joining.

We have focused too much on plot contrivances, rather than our characters where the heart and magic lies. Plot may be plot, but without good character, everything would all fall to hell. (That's like us getting around in Real Life while being sick and unhealthy. And that's terrible.) We wish to explore the facets of our characters — uncovering who they are at the core of their being, interacting with others and reflecting afterwards to themselves. We want to see what makes them tick, despair, worry, love, feel, emote. Drama. Drama makes it happen. Drama makes the fictional world go round. Hence, the appropriately titled *Character* thread. Not *Let's superficially react to whatever the fuck happens and see what'll come our way* thread.

Your characters in here are people. Like you and like me. Maybe they have different bodies and/or pathologies of thinking, but they are people nonetheless. You can develop them into someone interesting on the inside who'd we ourselves love to know someday meeting them. Don't you be afraid to have them face a difficult situation, and come out radically different afterwards. That includes things which you haven't expected them to face beforehand. Even dying. You'd have to face the truth that they can die, and dig their graves with dramatic repose when they eventually do (as much as it tears me up saying this.) Thus, include their fragilities too — don't you dare god-mod them out of harm's way with only a flesh wound. What tension would there be otherwise?

Some last suggestions I wish to say:

• Keep OOC-chatter to a minimum, would you kindly? Try speaking through your characters, and bring it up directly only if it's serious. I heard hearing alien voices in your head doesn't bode much for sanity.
• Depth, not breadth. I prefer one well-rounded character to micromanaging four generic mooks called "John, Jane, Wayne and Edward Cullen." Give him or her a distinct voice to speak with.
• Plot-wise, bring events out naturally. Try not to force an ice golem out of nowhere. This is an aspect especially vulnerable to being derailed, I've noticed.
• ''Carpe diem.'' Smell the roses, and enjoy yourself above all.

Remember that we have readers too, avidly reading along what we're doing. This is our story. Let's show them what we have in store. Let's make it something they'll never forget. Capiche?

edited 1st Oct '10 9:26:19 PM by QQQQQ

Unfortunately, "X" usually comes as trite fighting, or something else equally arbitrary.

This. I was about ready to claw my eyes out when

1) My character got sniped for no reason other than to bring up another source of conflict. Fighting does not equal characterization, which is why I brought up the romance shift.

2) The tenth page rolled along and none of the other characters actually bothered to have a goddamn conversation with mine. Which is also why I brought up the romance shift.

edited 1st Oct '10 9:22:24 PM by Leradny

My character sniped your character because yours was holding a shotgun to the only person in the world mine cared about. I spent several posts setting that up—and doing something for the sake of creating a conflict is reason enough to do something. Without conflict, we wouldn't have a story.

Remember, this is a story, not a roleplay.

And I looked back—your character definitely had conversations.

edited 1st Oct '10 9:38:33 PM by DaeBrayk

Okay, so, the not having conversations thing is the only thing that bothers me now. Rather less excusable as I set out conversation hooks EVERYWHERE for pretty much all of the characters in the thread and no conversation lasted for more than three or four posts before we had to go off and fight something else.

I am talking about meaningful conversations, not "everyone who's not a trained soldier get out" or "stay here till the fighting's over" or "stop throwing grenades without warning" (which came up like three or four times, what the fuck?!) or "I'm off to fight" or "Death does not mean what you think it means in Tarot".

DEFROST THIS FUCKING ICE QUEEN, PEOPLE.

edited 1st Oct '10 9:46:30 PM by Leradny

@Dae Brayk — focus on the whole picture, not the brushstrokes. Leradny felt that she and her character wasn't involved at all. I have started to feel the same, and maybe everyone else too. A story, holding a supposed meaning, cannot carry the meaning to the reader if the reader doesn't care. This is why I bring this up. For the record, conflict does not have to mean detachedly fighting it out with swords or guns in a vain attempt to be the baddest mother fucker on the planet badass. It can be a verbal duel between two characters on the edge. Or an inside tug-of-war between conscience and thoughts.

Conflict is meaningful conflict. Not one created for the obvious sake of conflict.

Let me clarify. A story is a role-play. We act out the roles to express ourselves and our feelings to others. This is here for aspiring writers like you and me to try sharing our characters and imaginations with others. It is our blank canvas to mould into anything we can imagine.

I wonder, should we continue this thread? Or shall we try restarting in a different setting? Possibly one more open for exploration, like the wilderness?

edited 1st Oct '10 10:37:05 PM by QQQQQ

Agreed. Our threads seem to spiral off into conflict by the 3rd page or so. We need to place a limitation on that, and a setting that will limit the capability for fighting as well.

definitely, we must limit the amount of extraneous and illogical conflict sources. If you have two differing philosophies inciting conflict, fine. But no barging ice golems and snipers.

I suggest a train.

edited 1st Oct '10 10:36:20 PM by Morgulion

Are you joking, Morg?

I say we have a library instead. Unless we already had one

edited 1st Oct '10 10:37:53 PM by Leradny

I forgot we had that trope, and now feel like a moron.

It was worth a shot. And, on second suggestion, now that I'm thinking more clearly, a library is far nicer.

edited 1st Oct '10 10:39:52 PM by Morgulion

Oh yeah, there's also this and this and this xD.

You've made your point, and I realized how I need to work on remembering tropes. Win-win. My suggestions are:

• A doctor's office.
• While it would take some effort and control, a prison.
• Museum.

edited 1st Oct '10 10:44:55 PM by Morgulion

Museum sounds cool!

Should we try and get this thread rolling again, first?

Library. Good for books. Bad for chatting. The librarian's always telling us to hush down..

I still like an outdoors place, somewhere ripe for adventure and peace of mind. How about a trail hiking up the mountain?◊ If that is alright.

A museum sounds fine too — 'tis a good place to show off our knowledge of historical artefacts. Wandering around, glancing at the trinkets.. falling in love along the way.

edited 1st Oct '10 10:50:02 PM by QQQQQ

That would be optimal. After all, there are still some salvageable parts, now that we are in a neutral situation.

Personally, I suggest everyone reads the first pages of the Character Bar to see what it should be; I maintain that this was the best of them all. Right until my character needlessly incited a conflict that seems to have set off this thread of development.

Anyway. Let's see what we can scavenge from these ruins.

On this high note, I'm off to sleep.

edited 1st Oct '10 11:00:23 PM by Morgulion

Anyone else want to say something? Before I ask the mods to lock down this thread, and let start anew?

edited 2nd Oct '10 8:30:53 AM by QQQQQ

Do we really need to kill it, Q? Leardny and I are game to keep going, and I liked where this was going before the arbitrary fighting.

I would prefer starting afresh. It helps flush the bad blood out and it'll be ripe for newcomers to join in too.

edited 2nd Oct '10 9:31:00 AM by QQQQQ

Some really good points people have made so far.

• Leradny: Less random violence and more meaningful conversation. I totally agree with you there. I really wanted my character to talk to people and maybe talk about my dwarves. Though I did not see your conversation hooks relating to Rainar, unless it was the time when he first came in. Or I'm just not good at seeing conversation hooks.

• QQQQQ: *lowers head in shame* I admit I did too much OOC chatting. It won't happen again.
  • That said I really agree that we really need to flesh out our characters. There were so many different places I wanted to go with Rainar, namely his whole connection with Noriko. I wanted to reveal that Noriko, although human, looks similar to Rainar's sister Morda whose death he still hasn't gotten over. (wandering five years alone can do that, I think...) This would give a deeper meaning to his strivings to protect Noriko. I could probably name a few more things I would have done, but that time has past. We must look ahead.
  • Wilderness sounds good there are many things we can do with wilderness.

• Just a personal thought, I think but we need to Transition better. I remember in the Character Nightclub people moved from a skyscraper to Rapture without missing a beat, and characters were able to chat in that submarine ride. Might be worth reading again guys.

edited 2nd Oct '10 11:05:45 AM by EldritchBlueRose

I remember one of the best things is finding out new things around the corner, evolving situations poking at our sense of adventure. Duke Zidler promised to revolutionize the world with his magick, but sadly he was mowed down by gunfire fusillade. Then we went beyond the confines of the nightclub to the other end of the city.. and down the depths of the ocean..

So shall we try continue this thread? Or head on to viddy the museum then? Or savour the glacier breeze as we hike the mountain trails in Lake Louise?

edited 2nd Oct '10 1:17:26 PM by QQQQQ

Eldritch: Yeah, it was a really low-key one when Rainar first came in, but we both got distracted.

I say we try to revive this thread. Start on a new day or something.

edited 2nd Oct '10 2:12:52 PM by Leradny

Should we have the same characters or new characters? Or does it really matter?

Just asking what is probably on somebody's mind besides me.

Oh and are we doing the Hotter and Sexier stuff as well?

I'll keep using my character, personally.

If the revival hasn't gotten rolling after maybe some arbitrary time period, we'll start the new thread and hope for the best.

If we're not going to continue this story, I'd rather we start over in a new thread. A museum sounds fun. Mundane, but interesting enough to add unique flavor. That's another thing we didn't much explore—the Hotel-ness of our hotel. For the most part, it might as well have been another bar/restaraunt/nightclub.

Oh—except when people tried to explore hotel-ness, the characters became too spread out and couldn't interact with each other. I think a Hotel might have been a bit too large a setting. People in Hotels rarely sit around in the lobby talking to each other—they sit around in their individual rooms.

edited 2nd Oct '10 2:51:11 PM by DaeBrayk

I propose a beach house.