Tribute VS. Theft

The line is there. It's visible to pretty much everyone but the person making the character, unless they're a selfish ass who's hoping to get away with whatever they can.

Making tribute characters is fine. It's roleplay, and sometimes beginners need some training wheels to work from. We all started somewhere, and playing a familiar concept can be a great way to getting your RP toes wet.

But outright character IP theft is a big no-no. You may as well just be playing that character, and not trying to hide it under a coat of gaudy paint and poorly Bedazzled™ faux-rhinestones. People will ultimately know, and you'll just look like an ass.

An example:

- A British woman of aristocratic blood named Victoria Devonshire, with dark hair who specializes in Egyptology and runs afoul of a sect of Set-worshiping crazies.

OR

- A British woman of aristocratic blood named Lana Croft, with brown hair and an immense set of hooters who specializes in looting burial sites and runs afoul of whatever villain-of-the-month she can.

The first seems perfectly acceptable, right? You can see where the player was influenced by the "Tomb Raider" series, and wanted to take their own hack at it. That's a tribute character, where you can see echoes of some other source, but it's not a direct rip-off. The second is just a plain theft, with a letter change to try and fool the inattentive.

Where it gets REALLY messy is when one player is making a tribute of another player's character. Maybe Player A just really liked Player B's concept, or B stopped playing the character and A wanted to try the concept for themselves. Using the aforementioned formula for developing the new character is fine; people familiar with the source would probably see the similarities, but your average player won't know a thing.

But the second example often rears its ugly head. Things are snatched that oughtn't be, or worse yet, Player B is totally unaware of what A has done, because A never asked for permission.

That's a personal peeve -- doing something in RP, in regards to another's character, without making sure the other player is aware/consents to the action. Consentism in RP is a topic for another day, but in this instance you are toying with the heart and soul of another person's creation. I'm sure you would hate to know someone ripped off a concept you spent so much time creating and building up. Why would you do it to someone else?

Common sense rules, folks. Always remember.

SOUND-OFF #2

Brought to you by some daffy bitch I spotted earlier today in game.

There's a quote somewhere, that if you have to tell everyone how bad-ass you are, you really aren't. If people have to be told how hard you are, then something's grossly out of place.

The same goes with RP. If you have to toot your own horn about some of your characters, what does that tell the people around you? Rather than letting them develop their own conclusions about your character, you're busily extolling their virtues from the creator's standpoint. And really, most every player is going to be proud of their character/s. It's how the creative urge functions.

However, it dilutes any possible good facets of your character if you're pointing them out to everyone. You're not giving the determination to the audience you're playing at, you're dictating it. You have stolen the person's opinion and obliquely replaced it with your own.

No one likes that.

People definitely prefer coming to their own conclusions about a character. And one of the most flattering things that can happen in roleplay is having another player come to you and compliment you on your creation. Out of the blue. Without grenade-fishing for compliments. When you have people giving you positive feedback, without asking, you've done something well.

But not that sycophantic bullshit. I'm talking real constructive feedback, not the "OMG ur toon is so cool and pretty!" crap that gets thrown around. The Polite Gopher™ shit doesn't count either, because that gets nauseating after about three seconds.

Don't fucking strain your arm patting yourself on the back. You just come off as some kind of drooling, attention-seeking lackwit.

Which strolls us into what I was originally going to rant about in this post -- throwing your Out of Character "resume" out there. Okay, so you've been roleplaying in some capacity for nigh-on twenty years. Congratulations. That doesn't necessarily tell me you've been doing GOOD roleplay for that long. In fact, what that tells me, personally, is that you likely have some horrible RP habits ingrained in you, and you will take any kind of constructive criticism poorly.

A player could have barely a year of roleplay experience under their belt, and they could be playing an exceptionally detailed and well thought out character. And that aforementioned 20-year vet could have a Chaotic Good "unholy" cyborg that can somehow infect/kill others with some sort of controlling power/energy/Godfuckingknowswhat. Chaotic. Good. Unholy. Do you even know the meaning of those words you've just strung together?

Talking about how awesome you are, as a player, is just as bad as pimping your character. Telling everyone about how much you know about X game system, or that you've been playing Y MMO since it first came out, means precisely dick. You could have read the core book from cover to cover, and memorized everything, but it still means shit. Executing that knowledge in being a considerate, thoughtful and evocative player is a horse of an entirely different color.

You may have the years, but you may also have the bad habits. I saw this immediately when "has taken on groups of heroes and won" appeared in the biography. What does that really tell someone? Does that let them know anything about the character, or that you are an inherent braggart who probably "likes" your own posts on Facebook? It tells me that you are likely not going to change any bad habits you've accumulated over the years, and any attempt on my part to help make your character better is going to be met with arrogance and a big fucking brick wall.

Listing off your player-resume in your character bio is just going to make me want to avoid you. Nevermind that the character you describe in that description sounds like it needs to have a wad of C-4 jammed up its vag and detonated. With a localized EMP burst, just to make sure all the inorganic parts are fried and useless.

If you're just dying to tell people how long you've been RPing, stop and ask yourself why. What does it matter to the roleplay? Does it enhance anything? Are you just looking to be impressive and come off as some kind of alpha dog? Do you want to lord that experience over players and control the outcome of the encounter?

To me, it just means you're asking for five across the face, and to go sit in the corner and think about what you've just done. I sit back and think to myself, "If that person had a Sassy Gay Friend, what would he tell them?"