Forums » RP Discussion » A Place to Belong

I'm talking about Furcadia mostly, but this may apply to other games also. But because of the player-driven content of Furcadia, I think is applies to it the most.

Have you ever made a really awesome character that you absolutely adore and are excited to start playing them, only to find that there's not really a place to play them?

This seems to be happening to me more and more frequently. Well, there are places to play them but nowhere I feel like my characters really fit in aside from my own creation - and I don't like secluding myself in one dream all the time. I do get tired of sitting in my dream after a while. The only other places I feel like I couple possibly play are places like The Golden Tether (in most cases, I usually say no thanks) or other "open-ended" type dreams that allow all kinds of characters. But I just feel like I'm having trouble finding a place for my characters to fit. And some of the lovely dreams I adore and could play my characters in usually are empty when I'm around and it makes me a sad, sad person. ;_;

Does anyone else have this problem at all? Or am I just thinking a little too outside the box with my characters?

No I noticed this too. On Gaia there were trends in threads but the majority were the same shit over and over again. I Think too many people have just drifted away from formerly popular hubs for roleplaying and just stopped altogether or were just chased away by a younger crowd who have way too much interest in Werewolf clans and Vampires, or whatever the latest trend is. And I don't mean the decent rps that can appear in these trend genres. I mean the ones that are cookie cutter copies of the same plot over and over and over and over etc, you get the point.

I mean on DA its easier, for me anyway, but I remember when MSN, Yahoo groups, aol groups, etc, were still active. I think instead of sticking to one thing, you should look around for a place, forum, group, something that will fit your character if you're truly going to be happy with how you play them.

I have that issue as well. I have a ton and a half of characters but I usually end up playing with the same few. But for me, I don't really belong to any other communities in which to roleplay.

Yeah, I've had the same problem too, and it's unfortunate. Some characters just don't work in the settings offered, and I find that some are too storyish to work well in open RP. These are often interesting, well-constructed characters, and it's a shame that there's no where to fit them.

This is one of the reasons I love stricter continuity RP since you have a chance to make characters that wouldn't fit elsewhere, but on the other hand, it is limiting to what you can make since you need characters that fit in that story. What about other fantastic characters?

Hmmm, pondering solutions.

Phew, I'm glad to see I'm not the only one fretting over this!

As much as I love the organization that goes along with strict continuities, my imagination tends to be like a hyperacive chihuahua and likes to run waaaaaay off the path like zooooooom! so I have a hard time settling into strict continuities. That's why I usually aim for 'open' dreams that have a very loose world setting. Still, there's only a certain number of those around Furcadia and I don't always agree with the types of things I find within them. -sigh-

That is why I like the Nexus world idea. Looser settings, the availability of many worlds and characters

I agree with Peacerose. A good portion of my characters have their own specific "world" or place where they live that makes it difficult to RP with others who are not part of that territory...
Like for instance, I have seen many others on this site that I would like to RP with using a specific character of mine, but then I think "Oh...that would never work because so-and-so would never meet this person cuz they live <insert name of random dimension/world here>

Though, I'm sure it couldn't hurt to break some personal rules now and again to have an interesting RP between new characters out there...

Yeah, I know the feeling. I've been trying to find RPs for two of my characters, but one of them doesn't seem to fit into any of the sci-fi dreams I can find (I don't think a Time Lord would be very welcome on some of them...), and other other really only ends up in short-term RPs. Then again, I'm extremely shy, so I don't know if it's exactly the same for everybody else, I guess I'm just generally the kind of person people have a habit of ignoring. I might have to try my Time Lord on a Nexus dream one day, but I don't know how well they would be received.

Hah, looks like lots of us are in the same position.

I get what you're saying about playing in open settings, especially since you come up with all kinds of character ideas. The problem I run into with that is there is very little common context to start from and certain well developed character ideas don't work so well in a loose setting.

It's really a conundrom, finding a setting rich enough to play these characters and present challenges as well as one open enough to allow for all sorts of characters.

This is something I've actually been thinking about a lot lately since I've played in continuities and more open settings. I've been wondering if there is a good medium ground, something that can be inclusive as well as very story oriented. I'm not really sure it can be done. I mean, if you have a character that's a sci-fi dude with lasers and another that's a medieval maiden, they're just not going to have common ground or a common place to interact.

Also, if you take a character out of their natural setting, say a King from his country or a priestess from her temple, then you lose a lot of what delineates them. Characters are naturally influenced by their setting, so if the setting is amorphous enough to be inclusive, the lack of limits makes a story almost impossible.

As much as I'd like to, I don't have any solutions currently. The only idea that pops into my head is a sort of revolving community where every month or so there is a new setting and story arc. Could be fun, having different leaders for each story. I suspect that would work better as a forum idea though, since having appropriate dreams would be rather difficult changing that frequently and story arcs would be very short.

Clearly, We all have to make a game together. Go. lol

This is actually why I sort of abandoned forum roleplays- my characters really only fit in the roleplays I made, and no one wanted to join those roleplays. Or they'd join and just be dicks. -3-

I'm lucky in that I have a partner on AIM who's willing to help build our own world from scratch, with all sorts of characters, and side worlds for the characters that don't quite fit in the main world. I'm very lucky to have my Misty, and I know it. ^^

I generally prefer one-on-ones over group roleplays, although I've enjoyed a group roleplay or two in my time. I think one-on-ones suit me better, if my partner is flexible enough, because my imagination will take an idea and run with it. Hand me a generic demons-are-the-overlords-of-humanity setting, and I'll hand you back a few pages of plot, a few books of background information, and a textbook worth of information on the demons themselves. I love to create worlds and species. I can't not do it. And maybe no one wants to bother playing in these worlds I make because they don't have a character who'd fit.

Personally, I tend to just make a new character to fit the new world, but again it goes back to loving to create way too much. X3

And then it would explode because we'd all be trying to make the same thing into different things and all we would have was some colorful confetti at the end.

Maybe we can lend each other a hand and help point each in the right direction! A bunch of heads are better than one flustered one, right? For example:

I'm looking for a dream in Furcadia to play my dragon character, Pheadra. She's a captured forest dragon stuck with a big iron collar that prevents her from flying and using her dragon magic (similar to the effect for fairies+metal but less extreme). She is feral, can't talk, but understands most common languages. Since her capture, she's learned that following the orders she's given equals being able to eat and not being whipped (even though it doesn't hurt with that hide, it's annoying), but she still got a grumpy 'tude.

I have the over creative thing too. I had a hyena character on Furcadia that I hadn't used much then retooled into a different character and since made up a culture and long background for it (Yes it. That's part of the story). In trying to find a place to role play I ended up making my own and getting much better at dream weaving then I once was (still not the best but the two good ones aren't bad if I do say so).

Also this is the one character I'll never have the 'oh but my character is from X place or universe' as much as with other characters as it happens to be a wandering hermit. (Due to my often wandering all over the game doing nothing or being AFK somewhere while I work on a dream in another window). I've had a little success with this character and actually meet a few people and did some role playing but (which may continue next time they and I are both/all on at the same time).

I should branch out a bit with this character and do non-Furc RP with it. Anyone want to play with a snthro hyena with the speech impediment and amnesia? Yes it can't remember before a certain point in it's life and yet I still made up a nice detailed background for it anyway even though it doesn't remember that stuff and likely never will.

(I have lots of worlds in my head. This is the first that's gotten written out at all and parts of are borrowed from real cultures so only half or three quarters by me).

Sorry I tend to ramble.

I am going to bask in the glory of have a roleplayer heavy friend group.

Usualy I tayler characters to fit into worlds or situations, keeping the same idea but maybe changing details that wont affect it to much. Sure, I can't make a mage in a high school setting, but I can keep the character idea and make her an occaut type. I know some people would think this blastphmus, but it means my options for my characters are open.

I think the best thing to have would be a large board with differnt worlds on it- because then people could have many differnt types of roleplays and settings, wich possible cross overs if plainswalkers came into play. Mostly, I prefer to find people willing to one on one and building a world for characters, always more than a few. This gives wonderful flexablility over the characters and the setting because things can change on a whim if something isn't quite working. Harder to do in large groups.

I will say what Nefferduat (had to copy-paste the name ) said: my characters are not carved in stone, and I more often than not tweak and change them to fit the situation. There are, of course, characters who could never fit a said situation without changing their essence, but in that case I just pick another one.

The fact I don't like having a continuity for my characters (I just don't like the idea) also makes fitting in easier, and funnier. That is, after all, why I RP. Tis fun.

Also, I often take the coward's way: assume that the character was minding their own business and then SLAAM - teleported to a new world. Or less extreme ways to say the same (traveling, etc.)