So I'm messing around with Sinde's profile, and I've come to wonder what people believe makes a good character profile. I love that you can customise the character profiles so much because I love being original, but at the same time I try not to worry too much over it. Because through art classes that I've taken I've been taught that less is more. But does that apply on a site like this also, and not just art and design in general?
I also have a follow-up question: Is the template you choose equally as inportant as the information for a character to make a good first impression?
Also if you want to, link me character profiles that you think look cool. It can be your own, or others.
I also have a follow-up question: Is the template you choose equally as inportant as the information for a character to make a good first impression?
Also if you want to, link me character profiles that you think look cool. It can be your own, or others.
I'm about to go to bed, but I just wanted to point out this article as quite likely of interest: http://www.rprepository.com/help/kickbutt-character-profiles 
I love the article Kim linked to!
What makes or breaks a profile can be very personal, but there are some things that work for almost everyone. I'm not fond of profiles that greet me with huge walls of text when I first browse, nor do I like it when the first page is almost completely empty. I like it when there's a section that gives me a summary of the character, and then something more in-depth for when I'm hooked on the summary.
Pearl here is one of my favorite characters and I made sure that her profile is accessible and has enough information without being overwhelming.
Templates can be super important in different ways. For starters, having one that matches the theme of the character helps get the reader 'in the mood'. A blood splattered template can really help that creepy horror girl's profile come to life, while the same template for a plain, average young girl is very mismatched.
Something that I really struggle with is when people choose to make their profile text tiny, or in a 'unique' font that becomes hard to read. (RPR has a very nice readable font at a nice readable size for a reason!) Whether it's through BBCode or CSS, the purpose of a profile is to store information for others to read. If you're going to make this difficult for them, you're excluding a lot of potential RP partners because they either can't access the information at all, or have difficulty with it. For lots of Epic Templates, compatibility is also an issue. I can't browse a lot of custom template profiles because the page ends up being 10-15MB in loading size alone (without the character art images sometimes) which crashes the browser on my phone/tablet. I have 250MB a month on my card IF I choose to enable internet outside of Wifi, so you can imagine this absolutely destroys my data limit, which gets cut off at 250MB usage. Lots of custom templates also aren't edited to work on mobile devices which means I lose functionality (can't click on links or access everything). It's up to everyone how they want profiles to work, but it's super duper frustrating when you can't even read the basic info on a profile because the template got in the way.
How you should create your profile depends on the kind of people you want to attract, I think. But if you want the broadest spectrum of potential RP partners, then functionality and accessibility should always be the main focus. Give enough to entice, offer optional expansion on the reading and keep enough mystery to hold on to that curiosity.
What makes or breaks a profile can be very personal, but there are some things that work for almost everyone. I'm not fond of profiles that greet me with huge walls of text when I first browse, nor do I like it when the first page is almost completely empty. I like it when there's a section that gives me a summary of the character, and then something more in-depth for when I'm hooked on the summary.
Pearl here is one of my favorite characters and I made sure that her profile is accessible and has enough information without being overwhelming.
Templates can be super important in different ways. For starters, having one that matches the theme of the character helps get the reader 'in the mood'. A blood splattered template can really help that creepy horror girl's profile come to life, while the same template for a plain, average young girl is very mismatched.
Something that I really struggle with is when people choose to make their profile text tiny, or in a 'unique' font that becomes hard to read. (RPR has a very nice readable font at a nice readable size for a reason!) Whether it's through BBCode or CSS, the purpose of a profile is to store information for others to read. If you're going to make this difficult for them, you're excluding a lot of potential RP partners because they either can't access the information at all, or have difficulty with it. For lots of Epic Templates, compatibility is also an issue. I can't browse a lot of custom template profiles because the page ends up being 10-15MB in loading size alone (without the character art images sometimes) which crashes the browser on my phone/tablet. I have 250MB a month on my card IF I choose to enable internet outside of Wifi, so you can imagine this absolutely destroys my data limit, which gets cut off at 250MB usage. Lots of custom templates also aren't edited to work on mobile devices which means I lose functionality (can't click on links or access everything). It's up to everyone how they want profiles to work, but it's super duper frustrating when you can't even read the basic info on a profile because the template got in the way.
How you should create your profile depends on the kind of people you want to attract, I think. But if you want the broadest spectrum of potential RP partners, then functionality and accessibility should always be the main focus. Give enough to entice, offer optional expansion on the reading and keep enough mystery to hold on to that curiosity.
I would say it definitely differs between person to person! Aside from obviously role playing with others, I use RPR as a way to keep a track of my characters whenever I do RP with my partners. Since I switch between characters here and am more likely to remember that, hey, this character has X thing going for them, or, hey, I need to update their history now, I can go do that.
I'm absolutely notorious for long winded profiles, but my first page and second pages of all my characters uploaded here on RPR are always what you, the player want to know from the get go. They are my character's appearance and vital details on the first page and their personality and quirks on the second page so that you know what you are getting into. The third page of my character profiles are always the ones you need a vested interest in order to peruse and learn the history I've concocted for them as well as the history they have made with RP partners and their characters should they tie into the same universe, or if they are vital to my character's growth.
I'm, personally, always interested in profiles that obviously LOVE their characters to go off into great detail about them. I love passion from creators about their creations, but I do recognise and understand the importance of having a small, accessible profile for people to digest at a glance.
I'm absolutely notorious for long winded profiles, but my first page and second pages of all my characters uploaded here on RPR are always what you, the player want to know from the get go. They are my character's appearance and vital details on the first page and their personality and quirks on the second page so that you know what you are getting into. The third page of my character profiles are always the ones you need a vested interest in order to peruse and learn the history I've concocted for them as well as the history they have made with RP partners and their characters should they tie into the same universe, or if they are vital to my character's growth.
I'm, personally, always interested in profiles that obviously LOVE their characters to go off into great detail about them. I love passion from creators about their creations, but I do recognise and understand the importance of having a small, accessible profile for people to digest at a glance.
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