On Characters

"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more."
   -Shakespeare, Macbeth

"Well we all have a face
That we hide away forever
And we take them out and
Show ourselves
When everyone has gone
Some are satin some are steel
Some are silk and some are leather
They're the faces of the stranger
But we love to try them on"
   -Billy Joel The Stranger

For all of the thought, planning, and imagination that goes into Elcea, or into any role-playing world, it would remain a static and lifeless place if it were not for the characters that adventure there. The player's creations, by interacting with the campaign world, bring it to life. This essay will look at the many characters that have appeared in the campaign, and make some general observations about creating and running characters.

When I was creating the roster of characters for this website I had the statistics for every character played in history of the campaign. My notebook, however, did not contain anything other than ability scores, alignment, level, and hit points. I wanted to put a little background information into each entry as well, but for that I had to largely rely on my memory. What really struck me was that for many of the characters, I could immediately call up all sorts of memories. Even many of the characters created 20 or more years ago were still vivid and real to me. There were other characters, however, that I did not remember at all. I had to go into my game notes to find out when they were played, and some of the things they did.

This led me to wonder what goes into creating a character, and why some of the results become legends, and others are quickly forgotten. The essential factor, it seems to me, is the connection between player and character. In other words, the more easily a player can get inside the head of his or her creation the more energy and creativity they will bring to the gaming table. Many of the characters that no one remembers any more were interesting, well constructed characters, but for some reason their creators never felt that connection; the in-game portrayal was thus relatively listless. The players, almost always recognizing that the character just wasn't clicking, usually abandoned them at some point in favor of a new character.

The best way to create a character that is easy for a player to identify with is to create one based on the player's own personality. John Eric Holmes, in an article in the December 1980 issue of Psychology Today titled "confessions of a Dungeon Master", wrote that "Almost always, the personalities of the characters turn out to be a combination of people's idealized alter egos and less-than-ideal impulses". This statement matches what I have observed over the years. It is especially true, it seems to me, for the first character or two that a player creates.

The idealized self type of character is appealing because it allows players a chance to be as brave, as heroic, or as daring as they always wanted to be. This impulse is especially strong, I think, among younger players, especially teenagers, but it occurs in all of us, regardless of age. Everybody has an idealized self image, and role playing games give people a chance to release that self.

A good example of this kind of character would be my sister Laura's cleric Scaevola. Scaevola was a force for good. He was noble and brave, and cared about righting wrongs and opposing injustice. Laura hates cruelty and prejudice and unfairness, and Scaevola gave her a way to fulfill her dreams of doing something about it. Make no mistake, she is not shy about taking action herself if she confronts such a situation in real life (she created quite a stir back in Michigan, for instance, when she registered for the draft while in high school because she felt it was unjust that men had to register but women didn't), but role-playing provides a setting largely free of the moral ambiguities and complications so frequently found in real life.

On the other hand, all of us have impulses and aspects that we do not feel free to express in our daily lives. Role-playing provides a wonderful opportunity to explore these parts of ourselves in a safe setting. This is a large part of the appeal of playing neutral or evil characters. We may not feel free to chop our supervisor's head off, or sleep around, or cheat on our taxes, but we can do those things in a role-playing setting without consequences (except within the context of the game, of course). That cathartic effect is one of the most important and entertaining aspects of role-playing, I think.

The poster child for this kind of character would have to be Pete Estes' hobbit thief, Bodo. Pete is a quiet, conservative, law-abiding guy. He also has a considerable sense of mischief and irreverence that usually lurks just below the surface, and in Bodo these impulses are brought to vivid life. Bodo is also arguably the most successful character in the history of the campaign, and I think that part of the reason for that is the fact that he comes so directly from Pete's inner self.

It was fascinating watching him run Bodo and his cleric Postumus at the same time. Postumus was dour and serious, rather like Pete's outward personality multiplied, and it was impossible not to view those two characters as the little stereotypical angel and devil sitting on Pete's shoulders.

Experienced role-players, though, can create characters that are nothing like their own personalities. It can be a lot of fun, and very freeing, to be somebody completely different for awhile. Role-playing, after all, has a lot in common with acting. With both you try to get inside the head of a completely different personality. Those who are good at it can put on and take off these personas the same way they would change outfits.

Many role-players, of course, tend to play themselves no matter who their character is. This is not necessarily a bad thing; John Wayne built a heck of a career out it. As an example consider Rich Rumbold's character Renegade. Rich was a fun-loving, straightforward, let's party kind of guy. His wizard Renegade was exactly what you would have ended up with if you had dropped Rich into Elcea and let him cast fireballs. Renegade remains one of the most colorful and memorable characters in the history of the campaign, and Rich had a heck of a lot of fun playing him. And that, of course, is what really counts.

This sort of character can be fun for experienced role-players, too. Mark Cook's hobbit character, Winslow, for example, is really just Mark unchained, as Mark freely admits. Mark can convincingly play a wide range of characters, but he has a great time with Winslow, and Winslow is a vivid and interesting character. In fact, despite the fact that Mark is a big guy and Winslow is not large even by halfling standards, when Mark is portraying Winslow I have a hard time not seeing a hobbit sitting at the other end of the table.

Characters, however, do not always stick to their creator's blueprints. They, like many sorts of fictional creations, are famous for moving in directions that their creators don't expect. A player might create a character with a firmly envisioned personality, but once the game starts the character moves in a completely unexpected direction. This sort of "character drift" is very common.

This time let's select Kim Williams as an example. As the personality of her character Mherlee has developed, she is a healer and a nurturer. Now, while these characteristics are undoubtedly present in Kim herself, I don't think it's the first thing people thought of when they thought about her, especially back in the days when Mherlee was created, before Kim became a mom. And I'm pretty sure that that isn't what Kim had in mind for her character when she started playing her. It was very interesting to watch Mherlee turn into that kind of character, though, almost as if she had a will of her own. Kim would have Mherlee do things and then sit there and shake her head a little, as if to ask herself "Why did I do that?".

I'm not sure why this happens, but it seems to me that if enough thought and imagination goes into a character there are bound to be things there that the player is perhaps only subconsciously aware of. And too, well-played characters, just like people, are shaped by the things that they do and experience, so as characters journey through the campaign setting they change and are changed by it. This phenomenon is a familiar one to writers, who frequently find that their characters take on a life of their own and move in directions their creators did not plan or expect. This points up the similarity between writing a story and playing a role playing game; the Elcea campaign, after all, is a series of stories created jointly by myself and the players.

Another basis for creating a character is to start with a model. The fantasy genre is filled with stereotypes, and many of these are familiar to fantasy role-players. The cunning and mischievous halfling, the gruff dwarf, the noble paladin, the strong but stupid fighter, these and many others are all common themes. Many of these types have appeared in some form in the Elcea campaign, and they can be very entertaining characters, when done with verve and imagination.

A perfect example of what I'm talking about is Barbara Hunt's character Orsnian. Orsnian is the model of the handsome, brave, and abysmally stupid fighter. And, as characterized by Barbara, he is both an effective character and frequently hilarious. Barbara has taken a stereotype and made it something fun and interesting. In fact, one of the advantages of using such a stereotype is that it gives the player an accessible starting point for the character, which can be used as springboard to develop the character more fully.

**

As discussed before, there is a strong impulse to create competent, dynamic characters. Most of us do not often have the chance to perform heroic deeds and do death-defying feats. Eric Williams, of course, sometimes performs death-defying feats, but he really doesn't intend to, so I'm not sure that his example counts. Regardless, there is something very satisfying in being stronger, tougher, smarter, and better-looking than almost everybody else, even if only in the context of the game.

I think, however, that flawed characters can provide an even more interesting role-playing experience. One such type of character is the otherwise competent character who has a weak point. Players know, of course, that any weak points they create in their characters will be ruthlessly exploited by not only the DM, but by their fellow players as well. Such weak points can be trivial, such as Big Toes McCracken's fear of deep water, or more serious. One might create a character with some kind of obsessive-compulsive disorder, for example, or a really crippling fear.

A good example of what I'm talking about here would be Laura's character Rusalka. Rusalka was a superb fighter, very tough, a barbarian from one of the northern tribes. She also had a culturally-rooted fear and hatred of magic, and every time she was exposed to it had to put herself through an elaborate purification ritual. In the Heroes of Telemarch, of course, such rituals became an almost daily occurrence. There's no doubt that it inhibited her ability as a fighter at times, but it was also very entertaining.

A more subtle example would be Postumus. The back story that Pete invented for this character left Postumus burdened with both a melancholy outlook on life and a deep-seated hatred of rats. The rat thing was only occasionally important during game play, but the deep pessimism and sadness of the character gave him far greater depth than he would have had as a confident, noble cleric of Eru.

Many RPG systems offer the chance for characters to take all kinds of "disadvantages" to gain more points for building skills and stats. These can range from the silly (lactose intolerance) to the serious (missing an arm). D&D's character generation system has no such feature, leaving players to come up with their own disadvantages. It may seem counter-intuitive to build a disadvantage or flaw into a character, especially since there is no concrete compensation for doing so, but it really can make a character more interesting and more challenging from a role-playing perspective.

Some characters don't need to have their creators invent a weakness for them - their own stats do that. There haven't been a lot of characters in the campaign who have been created with a seriously crippling statistic, but those who have been have been a memorable bunch. There was Mike Driscoll's dwarven fighter Nolgrud, for instance, who was ugly enough to stop a clock (charisma of 6), and Enkidu, Dennis Brauning's fighter, who was so stupid his vocabulary consisted of a handful of words and grunts (intelligence of 5). The best example might be Patkhin, who had a wisdom of 6. Leanne played his wisdom perfectly. It eventually meant the demise of the character - in this case, good role-playing made the character's death inevitable - but no one who saw Patkhin played will ever forget him. Characters like this can be a lot of fun, especially if their stats are otherwise good . Enkidu, for example, had an 18/34 strength, and Patkhin had a 17 intelligence.

Of course, there are many other ways to create a weak point in a character beyond giving them a strength of 4 or a morbid fear of spiders. Obsessed characters, to name just one example, can be a lot of fun, too. I'm thinking here of something like Big Toes McKracken's obsession with gold. An Ahab-like character, obsessed with revenge, would be interesting. So might just about any obsession, whether it's acquiring pearls or finding the one-armed orc who killed your wife. Such characters, however, are usually poor team players, as a well played obsession will usually trump other concerns, such as whether the other party members live or die.

In the case of Big Toes, his obsession really did almost get the party killed a couple of times. Having survived the experience, Big Toe's obsession has evolved into more of a "strong interest"; his character has realized that his friends and his growing camaraderie with them is more important than treasure. This is both practical from a gaming point of view and admirable role-playing.

**

There have been a lot of characters in the Elcea campaign, and it is interesting (to me, at least) to take a look at what kinds of races, classes, and alignments have been played. Here is how the 141 characters generated for the campaign break down. First, by class:

There are an awful lot of fighters here, but that isn't a surprise. Not only are fighters the easiest characters to play, but most groups carry more fighters than any other class for very practical reasons. The biggest surprise, to me at least, is the low number of thieves. Only 8 full thieves in 25 years, wow. Somehow that number seemed much higher to me. Of course, there are another 10 thieves in multi-class combinations; players seem to feel the need to give their thieves additional firepower.

Druids and rangers are fairly well represented, paladins and monks less so. Paladins especially seem to be neglected. Or, perhaps, avoided. This is understandable; I think that a paladin is far and away the most difficult class to role-play. In fact, and with all respect to those who have tried, I don't think I've ever seen it done really well. I think that Barbara's Alicante came the closest, but I know that running her eventually frustrated Barbara. Paladins tend to be both very annoying to the other players, and frustrating to their players because their behaviors seem so limited. I think it is possible to craft a paladin that is neither annoying or self-limiting, and I have players that could do it. Consider the gauntlet thrown.

There have been a fair number of multi-class combinations, especially fighter/thieves. In addition to thief combinations, which I've already mentioned, there are a lot of fighter combinations. I think this is because players sometimes want to give their fighters an extra dimension. All of the basic combinations have been tried at least a couple of times, except for cleric/thief. There has never been one of those in the campaign. There's another challenge for somebody, someday.

Let's see next how character race breaks down.

Well, it's a human world out there. This makes perfect sense, and is as it should be. The campaign settings are all in human kingdoms, after all. After that you have a fair number of elves and half-elves, some dwarves, and then really sparse representation by the other races.

This puzzles me a little bit. Halflings are a D&D staple, and Bodo and Winslow have both been great characters. It might be that, for much of the history of the campaign, Bodo cast a very long shadow for such a short character. In other words, those who played with him felt as though any halfling character they created would suffer by comparison. This is speculation, though. The only other hobbit character, Leanne's Kyryl, was largely created to play off of Bodo, so maybe that's the exception that proves the rule. Or maybe it just proves that I'm wrong.

As far as gnomes go, the few there have been have been a pretty unmemorable bunch. The only exception, Tom Van Hare's Aryahc Garionler, was perhaps the most gleefully annoying character in the history of the campaign. Since gnomes can be entertaining, effective characters, I'm not sure why they have been so neglected. Perhaps it's just the culture of the campaign; gnomes are the least common demi-human race in Xenthus, so they never got a lot of exposure. They have figured a bit more in the Bloodhawk campaign, though, so perhaps we will see someone else try a gnome character in the future.

I guess that the scarcity of half-orcs doesn't really need a lot of explanation; they are fun if a player wants to run somebody less socially acceptable, but that has never been a big part of a campaign as social as the Elcea campaign has been. They're also a good way to boost the stats of fighter who needs more strength and constitution, but players have always been able to find less ugly alternatives.

I think that the hardest race to play, by far, is elves. There have been a fair number of elves in the campaign, but of all the races the elven perspective is the furthest from human. This offers quite a role-playing challenge, and few players have captured it completely. Among the best, I think, is Alex's character Sapphire. I think that when Alex created the character he was at least partly aware of the challenges of running an elf, and set up his background so that he was not raised among them. Still, Alex never forgets that Sapphire is aware that all he really needs to do about most problems and enemies is to simply outwait them, and they will go away. He has centuries, after all, not decades ahead of him.

Finally, there is alignment.

These figures are somewhat skewed. There were a fair number of characters, perhaps two dozen, who were created back in the days before 1st edition AD&D. This was back in the D&D days, when the only three alignments were lawful, neutral, and chaotic, and chaos was associated with evil. All of these characters became either NG or, mostly, LG when 1st edition came out. This puts LG, NG, and CG in pretty close to a three-way tie, when in reality CG has been the most popular choice for most of the campaign. LG and NG really rank down there about with CN.

There has thus been a large bias towards chaotic characters over the course of the campaign. I think that this is largely due to the fact that players run characters partly as an escape from everyday life and all of its rules and regulations and constrictions. They thus want their alter-egos to have a wide latitude of behavior, and perceive that chaotic gives them more freedom than lawful does. I'm not sure that this is necessarily true, but that's the perception.

Since I discourage evil characters in the campaign (they can be fun, but that isn't the kind of game I want to run), let's take a look at the neutrals for a moment. CN characters outnumber LN characters by 2.5 to 1, more evidence of the bias towards chaos among the players. LN is an alignment that is difficult to play, much more difficult than LG, I think. Without the focus towards Good, what you are really dealing with is a character who lives by a rigid code, and adheres to that above and beyond moral considerations. Monks are naturals for this, but there haven't been many monks in the campaign. Richard Sullivan's monk Volant captured this idea very well, I always thought. So did Art Schaldenbrandt's monk, Alcuin, though in a rather different way. Volant was stern and rigid, whereas Alcuin was a self-flagellating ascetic. Both were right in the center of the LN alignment, though.

One doesn't have to be a monk to play an effective LN character, of course, though alternate approaches have been few and far between. There's another gauntlet thrown down to players. Let's see...someone picking up all of these gauntlets would run a lawful neutral gnomish paladin, a character that can't exist for several reasons. Ah, well.

I don't want to give the impression that I am advocating that everyone try and run a really outré character, either. It's kind of interesting when someone wants to run something really unusual, like a half-ogre mage or a minotaur cleric, but a little of this sort of thing goes a long ways.

**

Characters may die, or retire, but all of them become part of the fabric of the campaign. Tales of their deeds, or even of their spectacular deaths, are told whenever players gather and reminisce. I always look forward to each new character that is created, wondering what choices their players will make for them; what race, what class, what personality, and what each will add to the adventure. As I have said, the Elcea campaign is, at its heart, is a series of stories created by the players and myself, and every good story needs interesting and dynamic characters.

The more clearly defined and interesting a character is, the more there is for me to work with as I run the adventure. I may take ruthless advantage not only of a character's flaws, but of their interests, friendships, and enemies. On the other hand, however, I really do like to see all characters do well, especially the ones that are fun for me to game with. I may inflict all sorts of abuse and difficulties upon them (can anyone say "Savannah, Queen of Malqhuar"?) but this really is a sign of respect from me. If Lori is unsure what Maya should do about Roberta the bobcat, or if I know that Kivan just hates Dogface Pete the pirate, this helps bring the campaign to life not only for the players, but for me as well.

In conclusion, a disclaimer: I have used a number of characters from throughout the history of the campaign as examples. For each example I have used, I could just as easily have mentioned half a dozen or more other characters. I have left out many, many excellent and interesting characters from the history of the campaign in the interests of brevity. Perhaps in a future essay I will do a more detailed examination of the characters in the campaign, what made them succeed (or fail), and some of my favorite stories about them. If a particular player or character was not mentioned, all it means is that I have tried to limit this essay to less than 10 pages.

After all, I feel affection for every character that has become a part of Elcea. And you know what they say - you always hurt the ones you love...

Do you have any comments, questions, or responses to this article? Send them in! I'd like to hear them, and if there are enough interesting ones I'll add them to this page.

Ideas and contributions to future editions of "Mere Chronicles" are also being accepted.

Check out previous columns:

On Death and Dying

On Treasure

On Monsters

On Chronicling

On NPCs

On Combat

On Roots

On Dungeons, Part 1

On Dungeons, Part 2

On Dragons

Return to Columns.