How do you like to build your character?

Argent Dawn
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Hey AD gang,

in the spirit of all those recent relaxed, open-ended fun threads (shame a few got locked for no reason…) I wanted to make one of my own to discuss something that interests me personally considering the guild that I want to launch.

Namely, how do you all fine people approach the topic of character growth in your roleplay, either with past or present characters. Is it something that drives you to roleplay the most? What are the goals that you have for your characters, do you have a specific plan of building them to work towards that you want to accomplish no matter the roleplay you get involved, or do you allow random, spontaneous encounters to play a part in shaping your character?

The most important question that interests me though is: how did you start your character? How much of it was part of a pre-established backstory and how many elements did you leave to work towards in roleplay? Did you build their skills or have them equipped with powerful armour/weaponry as either parts of their backstory or “offscreen” or was it a part of your roleplay?

:spiral_notepad: :pen:

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I’ll start with the exceptions from my arsenal of characters, which are my troll druid and human warlock, both of which started out as relatively blank slates. The primary difference is that the warlock was created back in 2007, with me attaching a concept of him being a conscripted military asset which led from being a Sergeant during the Burning Crusade to becoming a Grand Marshal by the beginning of Battle for Azeroth. This was very much a journey he went through via Role-Play. I also only fleshed out his background around Wrath, detailing his past deeds from before the Dark Portal opened up to the launch of Vanilla, explaining both how he became a warlock in the first place and his hatred for the Horde.
In contrast the druid’s background is far simpler (having only been a soldier during the Fourth War) and which I feel will give me a lot of room to explore whatever themes and ideas I missed out on by being an Alliance Andy for so long.

The rest of my characters I have created have an extensive background, but also aren’t young or usually that impressionable. I have a tendency of thinking about the wars, calamities and pivotal events they should have survived and spend more time molding the character’s personality and agenda based on those rather than the day-to-day interactions that come from Role-Play afterwards. Hence they are generally set in their ways, views and ideals and come across as “solved” characters who don’t have much of an arc beyond finding their place in the world.

I’m not sure which I prefer at this point, as the novelty of the “young and impressionable” schtick usually wears off quite fast (I feel I already explored this through my human warlock’s journey), while my more experienced characters usually have little reason to hang out at hubs or join some guild as a fresh recruit. They are more prone to be about “How would a character like this react to or interact with xyz scenario” rather than organic growth.

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It’s a fun bit of step-by-step each time, but I think I usually approach it from one of two ways:
One is simply picking the race + class combo I feel like playing at the time, and then build on where those types (say, an orc warrior) would likely be in the world, what sort of situation - a grunt in Orgrimmar, a marauder in some unaffiliated warband, et cetera. Once this is locked down I can start looking at long term goals the character might have, and if it’s not something excessive, add it to their backstory.
The other is when some more specific idea hits me ready-made, like a Blackwater Cartel goblin thanks to the recent patch. Then it’s a simpler process, but I still finetune it like the above.
I generally like trying not-so-usual concepts and marry them together, too - try them for a few events, and if it proves to be too outlandish or hard to fit anywhere, then I move on to the next one.

I wish I could properly sum up my thoughts on how character growth works for me, but I think the biggest takeaway is that most meaningful bouts of that happened to my characters by chance. It’s fun getting a character into situations you might not expect because you get to roleplay out of it and add a new notch on your blade so to speak.

I do find that setting some sort of long-term goal helps me a lot; a mantra the character adheres to, old teachings of a mentor, some macguffin they want to find above all else. It’s a kinda realistic crutch to lean on if some sorta RP response doesn’t come naturally, and then it steers things along for you.

Not sure if all this rambling makes full sense, but I do greatly appreciate topics for these kinda thought shares!

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I can only speak for my main character Keento, but I started him as an isolated character that missed out on life, and had a blank slate on what he wanted to achieve in the game as he progressed and got more connected through roleplay.

Currently, he’s learning about druids, druidism, the emerald dream and everything that revolves around it. And it’s something I love to show in his outfit, his behavior and abilities used during roleplay.
To illustrate, Keento originally knew no magic at all. The first steps were learning to touch and control his mana. This evolved to shaping and steering his mana. Then casting simple constructed spells before learning to mold his mana into an element.
At this point in time, the fox is capable of casting 4 basic druid spells and shapeshift into a single animal.

And while the concept of mastering magic and classes is something that takes years in the lore, we as players of course do no have that kind of time or patience. So some things might be a bit rushed form the lore aspect, but I also make it clear that Keento doesn’t know everything, and that failure can still occur, often illustrated through dice rolls.

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Blondie is my RP main since most other RP alts have failed to catch my interest for too long. So I can’t say which is the perfect recipe for a succeeding RP build, except that I like to RP chaotic self-serving characters that are somewhat of a loser.

When I started playing Blondie I hadn’t play wow for over a decade, so I decided she had post-death amnesia so I could catch up with the lore a bit and have later her former life reveal to herself. However, she being an undead thru and through and not having a former memory of being anything as such became such a vital part of her character, that some silly dramatic reveal plot of her former self would only make the character less fun or interesting to roleplay as.

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Normally kick off a character with an aesthetic or transmog I like and then spend a month finding a unique sounding name, then I determine the necessary hooks of his backstory. I/E he/she might’ve fought in the Sons of Lothar, or the Peasants Militia.

I tend to never map out anything especially in the characters I play unless the character is like a Squire, but then again, I leave the development mostly to IC circumstance and happenings. Though, I mostly RP characters to facilitate character development and stories for others. Whether that’s playing a villainous tyrant, a teacher, etc, etc.

I generally don’t explore their personal arsenal of weaponry from being any different to your average NPC, and skill sets mostly come with the inception of the character

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My approach to character-building depends on the character, obviously. I usually start by finding a COOL NAME in the character creator. Then I roll a dice for a race, and another for a class. I’ve got too many alts to really go in with a concept, and I find the idea of building from an unexpected base fun enough. Of course, I run some countermeasures to ensure I don’t accidentally end up with ten elf rogues. But, surprisingly, I still have a bunch of elven rogues.

With a name and a look in place, I pick apart the wiki, old forum posts and whatever content (fan-made or canonical) I can find and work from there.

As an example, then — Gar’than Corpseburner.

I started off in Pandaria Remix, when leveling was easy as pie, with an Orc Warlock. Corpseburner seemed like a fun name. A strong surname for a warlock. Then, in character customization, I found his “look”. Grizzled, hunched — old.

I rewatched the Legion animatic for Gul’dan. I liked Gul’dan — I remembered the Stormreavers, the Dark Horde. Drak’thul. I did some more reading.

I settled on a rough concept I wrote while rushing through MoP’s brilliant story. “An Orc Warlock, Cultist, formerly of the Stormreavers who does not care about morals.”

A warlock of such stature could not be weak, so I added detail, then. Creating Gar’than — less so a character for Casual RP ( Which I have unashamedly used him for! Cheers to that Bloodtotem Tauren who hated him on sight as the gods command ) and moreso a looming evil I bring about as a villain in some campaigns.

I allow him to grow through some change in casual roleplay. I find it amusing to build up details for a backstory through random whispers — “ Did your character participate in the siege of Quel’thalas? ” “ Yes. Does your elf recognize this wicked warlock? ” — and so on and so forth.

Though Corpseburner as a character is very much a “finished” character. No further development or obtaining of items can make him evolve — unless he gets a power boost and makes the sunwell implode on a petty display of disregard for knife-ears.

Building a different character — say, one of my newer alts — a young Goblin courier, starts from a different place.

Birthplace, culture, and then… I just set the parameters for her growth. “She is a goblin mailwoman. She works for the Cartel. She uses explosives and her preferred melee weapon are brass knuckles.”

It’s a simpler concept, with PLENTY room for growth. So, in her case, I start her off with the basics, no fancy enchantments or knowledge of dark secrets — should she come across the Blade Of A Thousand Truths, well, that’s just how her character goes. Rather free-form.

Corpseburner, on the contrary, has already had his tale, lived his adventure — he has both the scars and stories to show for it. He has his skulls and trophies and warda — whereas the young goblin has twenty silvers and a lead pipe to her name.

I think my approach varies on the concept. For High Fantasy, high-power characters like a Vindicator, Artificer, Death Knight, or Ancient Monk…? I’d rather them not be pushovers. I’d rather they have earned their laurels. For a peasant, a squire, or a younger explorer — hell, even a dwarven mountaineer or something more malleable, I prefer building a skeleton, and let each different RP experience begin to fill in the gaps.

Which is why I find more malleable characters more fun to play. It’s a lower commitment, and their voice can change and bend until it fits into a narrative just right.

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It’s paramount, surely. There’s no story without conflict nor growth. They’re usually pretty foundational to how I build almost all my characters; whether it be internal or external.

Absolutely. From a personal P.O.V, my High Elf Paladin here Merondill, started off as a Mage-Priest transitioned into a Dawn Priest post-Second War, then with the fall of the Sunwell and the Scourging of Quel’Thalas he was slowly manipulated and lured toward becoming a Dusk Priest for the sake of his homeland’s security and safety, convinced of the righteousness of the cause at the time. Skip forward to the Shattered Sun Offensive and the Draenei-Thalassian alliance @ Quel’Danas and he runs into a Draenei Vindicator, Borees, whom he spent a great deal of time philosophising about theology with and was eventually through such conversations and the Sunwell’s rebirth (both a physical and metaphorical redemption) brought back towards the Holy Light and his “true” self as it were.

From there on he acted as a Priest for the Horde until late-BfA where the Horde’s allyship of the Void and Sylvanas’ turn forced him to try and, unsuccessfully, reconcile his beliefs with the active reality of the Horde having heralded in what was, essentially, a new Twilight Hour for Azeroth. Combined with the Army of the Light pledging itself to the Alliance and High King Anduin Wrynn’s own connection to the Light he eventually severed ties and sought a new path forward.

Originally, he acted as a Medic and Healer for the Sunnyglade Free Company for 1-2~ years, and then spent 2~ years with the Holy Order of Lordain to become a Knight-Aspirant - eventually becoming a Paladin-Trainee and then Annointed Paladin.

I wouldn’t quite say I had an utterly detailed mapped out knowledge of where I wanted Merondill to go from beginning to end, but about halfway through I did settle on the themes of redemption and grace. I wanted a character who could embody that side of the Church of the Holy Light and the Holy Light itself that I feel is often greatly overlooked on Argent Dawn - someone who has walked a dark path in life and was brought back from the brink by, what He perceives, as a form of divine providence. From that point on it was about bettering oneself, striving for goodness where goodness is possible, becoming a beacon for the concepts of redemption, hope and divine grace.

All of this taking place from… roughly 2018-2024.

Built over-time. He developed from a cloth-wearing primarily-caster Priest into someone who began wearing heavier armour during mercenary years, then as a Knight-Aspirant began to connect with the more Paladin-centric forms of the Holy Light. His weapon is actually partly-backstory and partly-development. It was written in his backstory to be a twinblade enchanted by himself but given to his twin brother (the same one whom he killed during his years as a Dusk Priest for fermenting Alliance sympathies in Quel’Thalas during their early years in the Horde ala TBC). In the Holy Order of Lordain, as part of his personal trials, events were then made to reclaim the fractured parts (2 pieces, for 2 brothers - Merondill and Atreonus) and bring Caladorne back to life and reignite its holy runes. The Twinblade itself can be found on the AA but for posterity:
Imgur
as drawn by @Reedsraven on Twitter

I think its largely possible to marry the ideas of pre-existing plans and spontaneous encounters to be honest - unless you start hitting some extreme examples. Plenty of spontaneous encounters have pushed Merondill back-and-forth for example, and my Blood Elven Mage actually only left the Horde for the Kirin Tor due to IC actions he saw happening in RP Campaigns and etc.,

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Every good character is a metaphor. Russell T Davies had a method for character construction I also use, where they come up with three adjectives to describe the person. This is excellent for coming up with NPCs in a hurry, and you can use this as the starting point before you experiment with the surface-level appearance. Focus on an aspect and exaggerate it.

Take this Warlock. Are you drawn to her pale eyes, her mysterious turban? The best stories are the ones you tell yourself, you don’t always need a big description if the visual storytelling is strong enough.

Almost always, a character you embody is a part of your own personality you’ve chosen to extrapolate. What matters is identifying emotions you can channel into them, think of things that bring you hope, despair, joy, rage. Roleplaying is meant to be a safe space for you to become someone else, and in so doing, come to understand yourself.

The rest stems part from the design, part from the personality Blizzard have invested in the animations. The backstory I work out as I go along. It’s all about discovering their ‘voice’, and once that’s in place, the character flows from it.

What’s important is never being afraid to experiment, to toss ideas out there, and constantly mutate until it works out. A simple concept is a great place to start, because that can grow into anything from their experiences.

Even if people don’t like it, at least they’ll have felt something, which is a sign you’re on the right track.

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Raw intelligence build wizard
Stealth archer if I’m feeling daring and want to try something unique

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Atahalni begun as a concept sometime in early Legion. I didn’t play him all that much then because I still mained my goblin Boush.

Like with all my characters, he begun as a very blank slate. I was inspired to make him in the first place by Matowa, who was one of the few people to pull off playing a tauren shadow priest in a satisfying manner.

I begun to build up his backstory, and ended up making his backstory a mix of Gul’dan, Agent Smith from the Matrix and various other villains from popular media. Essentially, I wanted him to be someone with a legitimately unfair/terrible background that people could sympathize with, but also to have that mote of darkness from the get go, which only got amplified the more injustices he faced, taking away the sympathy of others and becoming a self sustaining negative loop. Others treated him bad → He used that to justify his own bad deeds → people treat him worse - > rince and repeat.

This, as you all might understand, is quite a hopeless view on life. So I leaned into the nihilism with him, where he begun to blame his terrible fate on the world, and the lack of inaction from the many gods in Warcraft’s pantheon to help him, chiefly the earthmother. If this was a DND setting, Atahalni would 1000% be on his way to the wall of the faithless, because not only does hw not believe in the omnipotence and might of gods, he outright despises them. Even during his time in the Grim Gest, he kept a very transactional relationship with their god, never truly worshipping her for any other reason other than it giving him some things in return. And when that relationship demanded more from him (blind faith/obedience), he fled, because he could not and will never put his faith in gods.

I also put a price tag on his shadow powers. He got them, but for a price. Every time he uses them, he drains his own vitality. This is why, despite being just some 40+ years old, he looks close to 90 years old and very old, coupled with his crippled body defect from birth. Every breath and movement is painful, the whole of existance is, with only brief pauses here and there. That is why his main goal for the longest of times was to just end it all, and not just for himself, but everybody else as well. If he could not have fun, why should anybody else? Though, in a messed up sense, the pain and suffering he endures is also the greatest source to fuel his magic and spells.

This also puts a bit of desperation to him as a character, where he has to push for rsdical solutions and to take risks to try and find a cure for his condition. No matter the price.

Still, I did not want to entirely strip him of redeemable qualities. I wanted him to be relatable, and still recognizeable as a person, rather than an evil entity or a force of nature. He has fondness for other people down on their luck, and actually deep down craves for companionship and friends, though he hates to admit it.

I’d say about 50/50 was split between backstory and actual rp in the game. Atahalni’s empathy for example didn’t really exist until characters like Agonal and Melany treated him with kindness. And he also realized he really would have wanted to have siblings because of the deep bonds he grew with characters like Megnarosh, Gorwakhan, Kaiaara and Brokensun.

Atahalni very much had a glow up and a shrink down. He was always very good at using his shadow magic (especially mind magic), but he only became very strong both physically and magically after Gest’s god, Xasu’goth, fixed his crippled body and gave him back his horns as a reward for saving her from an angel’s blade with his fellow gest members. He became very strong and imposing physically, could wear terrible armour to battle and even trained martially with his fellow brothers and sisters.

And equally, once the very same god begun to be ever more demanding lf her followers, Atahalni had to make the difficult choice of either embracing the darkness blindly as a fanatic or give up his power for independence and freedom. He broke his horns and his body returned to normal, and since then, he’s been trying to fix himself back together.

He had a brief chance with Cursekeeper Association and Bloodsong to look for alternatives to fixing his body, and the latter also showed him he didn’t need that power, he was good enough as he was. But he craves to be beautiful once more, because he feels he deserves it.

Most of his eguipment is either self made or made by other players.

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Oddly enough, my most beloved characters have started with very simple, silly reasons even for their creation, whereas the concepts I’ve put the most thought into prior to ever getting them IC are the ones I don’t have much time to RP. Celysiel started as a throw-away character, Vel’arys so I had someone to wear the Fireplume set on and so on, so on.

I usually start with the appearance and a rough idea for a transmog, though nothing is set in stone. I might have an impression of what their personalities are like, or vague things about their past, but that usually gets solidified based on a sort of instinct when I first get the character IC. After the first or second RP session, having had a better impression for the character so I start designing their past. I notice that I often enough end up giving them traits opposite of their defining own, an odd duality that will always make them hypocrites of a certain flavour. It’s something I realise I do later and is mostly subconscious, but I’m really fond of it, as it makes the character feel a bit more alive.

But bottom line really is that I need to RP the character at least once or twice before thinking about them in depth. I’ve had several times when I’d planned a character through before, then went IC and they ended up being entirely different to what I’d planned, as the whole thing tends to be more instinctive for me based on getting in character, instead of making plans and pages of ideas. More of a gardener writer, if you would.

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Think I’ve explained this before with Felen.

Originally, Felen was made because I was a huge LOTR fan as a kid and loved Legolas but wanted Aragorn’s attitude towards him so I crafted him as originally a mesh between the two (Kinda cringe 10 year old me but it’s fine).

With that I really leant into the Farstrider / Ranger because seeing Legolas spinning the block and absolutely decimating the opposition just seemed really cool and the Belves did seem to be very much ranger-like based and with Aragorn’s type of leadership I had hoped Felen would really fit in with the scene.

Fast forward a few years and I realise that being a fanfic character is kinda silly and as I was new to the RP scene back then and was learning…I started actually building out into more of the “Blood Elf” lore and learning so much more about them to really iron out Felen’s portrayal to make it more lore accurate and at some point in time I kinda bled more towards Orgrimmar RP and that’s where Felen who originally started as this epic leet legolas fanfic turned into actual RP character began to express his Elven arrogance, posturing etc.

I really started to lean in to the whole “For Honor” and “For Glory” kind of tones and with Felen being around Orgrimmar and at the exposition to the Horde Community alarge in Orgrimmar there he started rubbing off a bit towards that whole mentality.

Eventually Felen just built into what he kind of is today which is a more aged, experienced character who whilst not completely abandoning his Elven Roots or going too hard on the Orcish side of things. To which I find him more comfortably within the setting of being a “Horde Character” rather than “Belf Char” or “Sin’dorc.” As much as people may try to say he is :rofl:

I really just started him off as some empty-shell that really built into a proper character with the stories that happened, interactions with the community, so on, so forth.

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I don’t really have plans as such, I tend to make a character, throw it at a wall (that wall being rp) and see what sticks. This does leave their character in a bit of a limbo and random state at the start but I find they quickly grow into a personality - or the character doesn’t work and is put on a bus. In truth most end up on a bus, but the ones that do land, land well.

I’m terrible with goals both irl and in rp. People ask me “what do you want to eat? Where do you want to be in five years?” the answers the same. A shrug and a “I don’t know/mind/care” and I find my characters ‘goals’ follow the same idea. I can’t make a driven character because, frankly, I’m not driven.
Nevertheless my characters work and function and grow, so it comes together.

All a long winded way of saying ‘my characters grow through dynamic rp vs an actual rigid stuck to plan’. The one time I did try an actual ‘plan’ I got bored.

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I have a simple process:

First, think what I wanna RP race-wise.
Then think of a very basic concept and choose the class that matches best.
Then open google docs and make a profile with a basic profile layout I have, filling it out while coming up with a story for the character, using wowpedia/whatever lore website to help out. I tend to write the character’s history to each year so it’s pretty flawless.

Then I try it out and let whatever happens in RP dictate the future, as you do.

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I usually have a rough idea of a concept, a very rough idea of a background and then make a char and go from there. Somehow, my well thought out concepts never stuck, but chars that I used more as NPCs or sidekicks for events or business suddenly made contacts and slowly developed into ‘real’ chars - why I don’t bother with big ideas before anymore.

I enjoy playing chars that can develop in RP dynamically, be it trainings, lectures, lessons, experiences etc., that’s my jam. I have a few that are beyond that learning state, but not many.

What I do all the time is taking notes of what they are doing, what they learned, how their perceptions of things change, as well as of what I told about their history/background, which I in detail often just ‘make up’ on the go.

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I used to be very visually oriented so I would have started with a look and aesthetic, which would more often than not already resolve the class issue. Then followed the goal - why this character was in a certain place or situation and what he wanted/needed to do there. The personality took care of itself more times than not.

Nowadays I think in stories, overarching narratives governing the history of a place. Then I imagine the actors at play in this theatre and craft a suitable role.

In my very first days roleplaying it was more of a power fantasy, of course. Embodying a version of myself that I thought was cooler and better and more interesting. I’m glad I moved away from that and the many issues and conflicts it brought into play. Detachment is key!

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First, I have an idea of a concept in the shape of a thing. This vauge blob of potential is then kneaded vigorously in my brain-folds to resemble an individual.

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Fixed in 10

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I still do it this way most of the time. My nightborne that I play now started because I like nightborne a lot, but didn’t actually cement itself as a character I wanted to play fully until I’d found a mog and vibe that felt good which then got my mind working on who they were, what they did and what motivated them.

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