rpanons | Spapeggy and meatballs

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i like to play nice and heroic characters, and the type of characters who tend to go out of their ways to help others and don't mind putting others above themselves. i eat this stuff up anons. this goes double for games where it's difficult for a character to remain that way because of darker settings. otoh regardless of setting, the character type is often accused of being bland or boring.

any tips for keeping this character type interesting, anons?

Generally, I think the best thing to do is to remember to show their other quirks or character traits beyond just the "niceness." Do they have any interesting hobbies? Any insecurities? A weird, obsessive interest in something? Are they energetic to the point that people might find them overbearing? Klutzy? Stuff like that.

Usually, "nice" characters will have some sort of quirk like that to help them stand out or give them a little flavor, and that's usually the best way to keep them interesting, IMO.

This right here. I play a nice character and this is exactly what I do to make him interesting.

I once encountered this one article. It was about dating and I think the entire Nice Guy thing, but it posed the question...would you date someone just because they're nice? No, saying you're nice is like saying you've got skin or you breathe oxygen in terms of qualifiers. You'd date them because they're fun to be around, or they've got a sense of humor, or you like how they're serious, or whatever.

Obviously this doesn't exactly apply - I RP a few douchebags, my friend RPs the Joker - but I think the same basic idea applies. Are you picking them up just because they're nice, or are you picking them up because they're nice and you like their tendency to blush when flustered or their fondness for kittens?

Like, speaking personally, I tend to pick up characters who have sibling issues for some bizarre reason, but I don't pick them up just because they angst in their brother's direction. No desire to RP Sasuke, thanks.

Or, I guess, tl;dr, figure out what makes them interesting to you and interesting as a character, don't just get hung up over the fact they're nice since that's not all they are.

If the character likes to help others make sure they're genuinely helping others. The main two problems I see with helpful nice characters are:

-Scenario 1-
Susan is sad because Bob's cheating on her with Carol. Makes some vague post on the network asking what to do when people leave you behind.

Hero comes in, decides Susan's problem is her friends getting sent home from Jamjar X and starts giving her a whole lecture about keeping people in her heart and treasuring them always and that this is the only real solution to her problem.

Susan tries to correct Hero a few times, Hero is completely obtuse and continues blathering on "nicely". Hero feels they've helped and offers to be friends saying they'll help Susan stay positive! In the end Hero never actually learned anything about Susan or the problem. But they were nice and polite.

-Scenario 2-
Susan is sad because Bob's cheating on her with Carol. Makes some vague post on the network asking what to do when people leave you behind.

Hero replies asking a few questions as to what happened, Susan gives some preliminary information, Hero decides the only thing to do is to give Bob a lecture! Hero doesn't ask at all about how Susan feels. In the past Susan was in a relationship where she was manipulated and used and she's afraid it's happened again, it's the real reason she's sad because she feels she's failed as a person. She does not want to go yell at Bob. Hero insists they go correct Bob on how ladies should be treated. Hero is being a gentleman and trying to stick up for Susan.

: Both of these situations the hero character is vapid and aggravating to play off of. There's no real connection between the characters. Sure Hero's being nice, but they're not connecting with the person they're trying to help at all. If your character is trying to help out and they're nice make sure they get a feel for the other character, learn about them, get the other character's opinions and emotions. Come off actually interested in the other character rather than just leaping at another chance to help someone out.

That said not all nice characters are smart characters. Maybe your nice helper really does jump into things without hearing all sides of the situation. Play that up. Make it clear to the other player you know your character's being kind of a doofus and you'd love to get into shenanigans where their helping turns out to be not so helpful or even their helping is so over the top it fixes the situation by sheer crazy.

Nice characters have flaws just like everyone else and playing these up can definitely help your nice character be more interesting. Even just things like they can't swim or they're a bad cook. Create situations to work with those. Maybe they dropped the keys to their jamjar apartment in a pool and need help getting them back, maybe they want someone to give them cooking lessons. Whatever you come up with make sure it's something you're comfortable going into detail with and writing out. I see characters who are gag bad cooks ask for cooking lessons all the time and all the logs turn out boring because the tags gloss over everything their character is actually doing that makes the food come out bad. There's nothing to reply to in their tags because all there are are empty words. Make sure it's something you can write about and keep interesting.

The only other thing I can really say is engineer situations where your character won't just be politely nice. Maybe they got attacked by a monster and because of the blood loss they're uncannily open about themself and share some things from their past with the person who comes to help them. Or maybe they've had a bad day and the next thing that goes wrong they're going to start swearing up a storm and throw a small tantrum even though they're usually always super composed in front of others. Nice characters are fine, but when that's all other characters see it gets boring.

Spapeggy and meatballs

"Nice" Characters

Re: "Nice" Characters

+1

+1

Re: "Nice" Characters